Ding Zilin, the founder and leader of the Tiananmen Mothers wrote a book in 2005 about the victims of the Tiananmen Massacre. Over the course of the next two weeks, we will be releasing excerpts from the book in English.
What Sense Could There Be In Killing This Old Man?
Who would have ever thought that the elderly worker in this picture would be gunned down by Beijing’s martial law soldiers?
This smiling old man’s name is Zhang Fuyuan. He was 66 years old at the time of his death. Born in Henan Province’s Gaoyang County, in the city of Baoding, he had worked as an apprentice as a young man, survived the Japanese invasion and the Chinese Civil War, and was finally “liberated” in 1949. In the 1950’s, he was assigned to be a worker in Beijing, and eventually joined the Chinese Communist Party. His background should have made him the vanguard of the leading class in our “people’s republic.”

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