Give the Chinese students their history back!

Dear

I send this mail in memory of the massacre in Tiananmen Square in Beijing in 1989. It is forbidden to mention the massacre in China, and each year fewer yet know what really happened. But all media articles, fliers etc. on ths subject have been collected by the democracy movement in Hong Kong, and can be downloaded for free here. I send you this mail and all the documents, so that you can help in giving the Chinese their story back.

In memory of the 31^st anniversary of the massacre, I enclose this appeal, and hope that you will pass it on to your Chinese friends, institutions, and others who might benefit from remembering this landmark event.

In 1997, I erected an 8 meter tall monument in Hong Kong in memorial of the massacre. This monument is so far still the only memorial about the Tiananmen Square massacre on Chinese soil.

Placing this sculpture in Hong Kong cost me a permanent expulsion from China and two expulsions from Hong Kong. I think it's important that artists, cultural groups, and others defend human rights, and that we use our freedom of speech to tell the story of the massacre. I hope that you will help in doing this.

31 years after the massacre history seems to be tragically repeating itself. Now with Hong Kong as the epicenter for youth demanding their basic Human Rights and the Chinese Government forcefully fighting down the youth. China latest move to passe landmark legislation to force national security laws in Hong Kong, effectively crushing the city's autonomy, the situation is further excalating.

I have in February 2020 erected ‘A Pillar of Shame’ sculpture in front of the Danish parliament, as a protest against that China is once again using extreme force against youth people demonstrating for their democracy rights, this time in Hong Kong.

The China's National People's Congress are now directly interfering with the justice system and the freedom of speech in Hong Kong, which is an unprecedented violation of the agreement between England and China for the handover of Hong Kong. This is yet another move that shows that China is preparing to fundamentally change the status of Hong Kong so basic Human and Democracy rights will no longer be respected.

I hereby encourage everyone to protest against China’s assault on Hong Kong citizens.

In Denmark there will be a ceremony in front of the parliament to bring attention to both the 31^st anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre and China’s current assault on Hong Kong.

Let us remeber the youth that lost their life at Tiananmen Square and let us support the youth in Hong Kong, so we will not see the same tragic outcome once again.

Kind regards,

Jens Galschiøt

The Chinese sight for ”The old cannot kill the young forever” chiseled into the socket on the memorial.

Drawing by Badiucao placed on the Pillar of Shame: It is artistically brilliant that he has managed to link the brutal use of power, the democracy movement and the exploitation of the corona crisis. At the same time, there are references to the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, where China slaughtered thousands of peaceful protesters fighting for basic democratic rights. History now repeats itself 30 years later with young people in Hong Kong fighting to preserve these rights

Appeal to the press, culture- and art institutions, artists, working places, libraries, universities and others.

Give the Chinese students their history back!

Help mark the 31^st anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre. In 1989, Chinese students occupied Tiananmen Square in Beijing for months in an attempt to press the Chinese government to take steps towards democracy and to fight against corruption. But on the 4^th June, 1989, the regime sent in the army against the unarmed students.

Give the Chinese their story back. It is forbidden to mention the story in China, but all the students’ newspaper articles, fliers etc. have been collected by the democracy movement in Hong Kong. These collections of Chinese and English documents have now been put on the Internet where they can be downloaded for free.

Many of the young dissidents were imprisoned in the wake of the crackdown. Some are still in jail but they are no longer young. China still practices massive censorship of information abour the massacre. And it is impossible for Chinese people to obtain uncensored information about the event.

In China the encroachments continue. The year Nobel winner Liu Xiaobo died after having been imprisonned several times in China, and artists like Ai Weiwei and Badiucao are exiled from China. But these prominent artists are only the tip of the iceberg, there are thousands of artists, environmental activists and others imprisoned. And all they have done is defend their most basic human rights.

Thousands of Chinese students are today studying at universities and other institutions of education in the West. Most of them do not even know their own history due to the censorship. You can help remedy this.

Therefore we invite all pro-democracy institutions, scholars and working colleagues to download and print out this documentation or put it on a USB flash drive. Place it on the shelves of libraries and hand it out as a gift to Chinese students on the 4^th June, the anniversary of the Tiananmen massacre.

This way we can make a contribution to preserve the memory of the victims, and maybe inspire a new generation of Chinese to see democracy as a possibility in China.

We call on everybody to support this initiative and to mail this appeal to other institutions of education where there are Chinese students, or others who might be interested in preserving and distributing knowledge about the Tiananmen massacre.

The initiative of this appeal and information campaign is a co-operation between the democracy movement in Hong Kong and Danish sculptor Jens Galschiot.

About Hong Kong at the moment

It seems that China’s supression of free speech still has a solid grip, also in Hong Kong. Galschiot is just one of many critics who have been denied entry. So the city is deprived of a cultural exchange that is taken for granted in all open democratic societies. The expulsions are a blatant violation of the principle of ‘One country – Two systems’ that was guaranteed as part of Hong Kong’s reunion with China in ‘97.

In 2013 Galschiøt managed to enter Hong Kong to repair ‘The Pillar of Shame’. In these very years Hong Kong stands on the precipice of realizing the 1997 agreements with China, to develop a real democracy in Hong Kong. But they are under a lot of pressure from non-democratic forces. The results of these negotiations are crucial for the future of Hong Kong.

Throughout 2019 and 2020 massive demonstrations in Hong Kong have taken place. They fight for their basic human rights that China promised Hong Kong's citizens when they took over the country in 1997.

The peaceful demonstrations have been met with comprehensive violent force from Hong Kong's police, and the citizens have been defending themselves agains the police´s pepperspray cannisters with simple umbrellas.

A functioning democracy on Chinese ground, even though only in Hong Kong, is an extremely important symbol for the more than one billion living in mainland China.

Useful links:

Download the documents about Tiananmen 1989

Galschiot’s activities related to China

The democracy movement in Hong Kong:

HK Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China
E-mail: contact@alliance.org.hk, internet: http://www.alliance.org.hk/

Phone: +852 2782 6111

Contact Jens Galschiot: E-mail: aidoh@aidoh.dk, Internet: www.aidoh.dk, tel. +45 6618 4058, Banevaenget 22, DK-5270 Odense N

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About Jens Galschiøt:

Danish artist Jens Galschiøt has created many socio-critical sculptures and installations through the years. Most often they are placed in public spaces around the world – as needle-sticks and silent reminders of a world that, in his opinion, is out of balance, and where exploitation of the world’s resources, inequality and migration are a constant part of the picture.

General information about Galschiøt can be found at:

See Wikipedia:

Portrait of the sculptors CV (PDF)

To Gallery Galschiot

To Galschot webside