2001 Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident

government compound in April 1999 to request an end to official harassment of Falun Gong practitioners. Soon thereafter, a nationwide persecution of the practice began. Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a form of spiritual qigong practice that involves meditative exercises, and a philosophy drawing on Buddhist and Taoist tradition introduced by Li Hongzhi in Northeast China in the spring of 1992. By the late 1990s, it had attracted tens of millions of followers. Falun Gong initially enjoyed official recognition and support during the early years of its development. By the mid-1990s, however, Chinese authorities sought to rein in the growth of qigong practices, enacting more stringent requirements on the country's various qigong denominations. In 1996, Falun Gong came under increasing criticism and surveillance from the country's security apparatus. On 25 April 1999, more than 10,000 practitioners gathered outside Chinese Communist Party (CCP) headquarters in Zhongnanhai to request legal recognition. That evening, then-CCP general secretary Jiang Zemin issued a decision to eradicate Falun Gong. At Jiang's direction, on 7 June 1999, a special leading group was established within the party's Central Committee to manage the persecution. The resulting organisation, called the 610 Office, assumed the role of coordinating the anti-Falun Gong media coverage in the state-run press, as well as influencing other party and state entities such as the courts and security agencies. Tens of thousands of Falun Gong practitioners were imprisoned, and by the end of 1999, reports began to emerge of torture in custody. According to Ian Johnson, authorities were given broad mandates to eliminate Falun Gong and pursue the coercive conversion of practitioners. Still, they were not scrutinised for the methods they used. This resulted in the widespread use of torture, sometimes resulting in death. Tiananmen Square was one of the main venues where Falun Gong practitioners gathered to protest the persecution, usually by raising banners in defence of the group, or staging peaceful meditation sit-ins. Ian Johnson of The Wall Street Journal estimated that by 25 April 2000, more than 30,000 practitioners had been arrested for attempting to demonstrate in Beijing, most of them in or on the way to Tiananmen Square. Seven hundred Falun Gong followers were arrested during a demonstration in the Square on 1 January 2001. Chinese authorities struggled throughout the early years of the persecution to turn public opinion against Falun Gong. Instead, the campaign garnered criticisms from across a wide spectrum of Chinese society, with an article in a liberal Chinese media outlet on how repression in Nazi Germany escalated over time. According to Human Rights Watch, "the leadership's frustration with the failure of its efforts to quickly and thoroughly dismantle Falungong was also evident in its media campaign." The state-run press admitted in late 2000 that Falun Gong was continuing to stage protests in defiance of the ban, and proclaimed that "the 'broad masses' had to be made to understand the 'duration, complexity and ferocity of our battle with Falun Gong.'" == Incident ==

On 23 January 2001, the eve of Chinese New Year, five people in Tiananmen Square poured gasoline over their clothes and set themselves on fire. He proceeded to pour gasoline over himself and set himself ablaze. The authorities then put out the flames consuming the other four people's clothing. Of these, Liu Chunling and Liu Siying, as well as Hao Huijun and Chen Guo, were a mother-daughter pair. Liu Chunling reportedly died on the scene. Her 12-year-old daughter Liu Siying had been hospitalised at Jishuitan Hospital, with fourth-degree burns over 40 percent of her body, requiring the amputation of all ten fingers, when she died on 17 March 2001, "unexpectedly of heart troubles". The other three that set themselves on fire were reported to have been "severely disfigured". Liu Baorong and Liu Yunfang were reportedly stopped by police before they could light themselves on fire. On 3 February 2001, state media reported statements by two of the self-immolators. Wang Jindong "insist[ed] that he is not worried about his horrific burns because he is a Falun Gong disciple" while Liu Siying "regretted her action and said she was cheated by her mother". In April 2002 the government allowed foreign journalists to interview the survivors in the presence of state officials. When asked why they set themselves on fire, Hao Huijun replied that she had realized the futility of writing letters and demonstrating by waving banners, "so finally, we decided ... to make a big event to show our will to the world. ... We wanted to show the government that Falun Gong was good." At the time of the interview, Chen Guo and her mother were said to still be in the hospital, both having lost their hands, ears, and noses. Both her mother's eyes were covered with skin grafts. Wang Jindong, showing burns to his face, said he felt "humiliated because of my stupidity and fanatical ideas." == Chinese media reports ==

The state-run Xinhua News Agency released a story about the incident to foreign media two hours after the self-immolation occurred. Xinhua then distributed a fuller press release seven days later on Tuesday 30 January, in response to other media reports on the incident. China Central Television aired footage, said to be taken by nearby surveillance cameras, of five people in flames. Chinese authorities stated that the seven people who had come to Tiananmen Square with the intention of immolating themselves were all from the city of Kaifeng in Henan province. Xinhua asserted that the self-immolators were "avid practitioners" of Falun Gong who had taken up the practice between 1994 and 1997, and that they fantasised during the preceding week about "how wonderful it would be to enter heaven". A press release from the Chinese government says that Liu Yunfang felt that the police were able to stop him burning himself because he had not attained the "required spiritual level." Articles in the Yangcheng Evening News and the Southern Daily reported that police had evidence that a few foreign reporters had advance knowledge of the incident, and suggested that such reporters could be charged with "instigating and abetting a suicide." State media claimed surveillance video showed six or seven reporters from CNN, the Associated Press and Agence France-Presse arriving just 10 minutes before the self-immolations took place; however, all three agencies denied advance knowledge of the incidentAP and AFP said they had no reporters in the square at the time. In contrast, CNN's chief news executive, Eason Jordan, said the CNN crew was there on a routine check for a possible Falun Gong protest. == Falun Gong response ==

Immediately following the self-immolation, the Falun Dafa Information Center denied that the self-immolators could have been Falun Gong practitioners, writing that Falun Gong's teachings prohibit killing and that suicide is considered a sin. Specifically, Wang Jindong was said to be multiple actors and not a real person. Falun Gong has also charged that all of the self-immolators were replaced with actors while inside the ambulance. Falun Gong sources overseas questioned the official Chinese government account of the event, Falun Gong released a frame-by-frame analysis of the CCTV footage which purportedly shows that Liu was actually killed by a deadly blow to the head from a man in a military overcoat. Some Falun Gong sources argue that the government may have killed her as a way of guaranteeing her silence. == Third-party findings ==

The identities of some of the self-immolators, and their relationship to Falun Gong, were called into question by Philip Pan of The Washington Post. Pan found most residents in Kaifeng felt disgraced by what Liu had done (i.e. the self-immolation). Still, none of Liu's neighbours had ever observed her practising Falun Gong. They said Liu abused her mother, and the reporter heard that Liu "worked in a nightclub, took money to keep men company". Foreign journalists were not allowed to interview the self-immolation victims recovering in hospitals, neither were the victims' relatives, according to David Ownby. Pan wrote that "Beijing denied requests to interview Liu Siying and the three other survivors, who are all hospitalized ... A Kaifeng official said only China Central Television and the official New China News Agency were permitted to speak to their relatives or their colleagues. A man who answered the door at the Liu home referred questions to the government." The Age commented that the "ready availability of fire-extinguishers and official TV teams and the lack of verification about the victims" raised questions about whether authorities had advanced knowledge of the self-immolation. Police were on the scene of the self-immolation within 90 seconds, carrying numerous pieces of firefighting equipment. A European journalist was quoted as saying "I have never seen policemen patrolling on Tiananmen Square carrying fire extinguishers. How come they all showed up today? The location of the incident is at least 20 minutes roundtrip from the nearest building – the People's Great Hall", noting that it would have been too late to get the fire extinguishers from the building. John Gittings of The Guardian stated, however, that it was common practice in many countries for police camera operators to be on hand when a public disturbance is anticipated; the police used small-scale fire-extinguishers of the type carried in public vehicles, many of which are routinely on the square. Similarly, Helen Farley described the protest as organized independently of Falun Gong hierarchy but without any Chinese involvement, observing that "some of the adults had participated in previous protests." According to the Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, all self-immolators except Liu Siying previously participated in protests against China's actions on Falun Gong on Tiananmen. == Dispute ==

Following the incident, the details of why the individuals were involved have been and remain the subject of dispute between representatives of Falun Gong, the Chinese government, and other observers. A significant challenge to arriving at a definitive assessment of the event is that independent corroboration of the government's claims has not been possible. According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), the lack of independent information made the incident one of the most difficult stories for reporters in Beijing to report. The New York Times stated that conflicting claims were difficult to assess "[w]ith propaganda streaming in from seemingly opposite ends of the universe ... especially since the remaining Falun Gong practitioners have been driven underground." Philip Pan's investigation, Clive Ansley, a Vancouver-based rights lawyer who lived in China during the self-immolation, suggested that a dramatic response by Falun Gong would have been understandable, but ultimately concluded that the event was staged: "You've got Falun Gong people in this country, they've been oppressed over and over again, they are not allowed to speak, they are not allowed to assert any of their rights as citizens, the level of frustration must be terribly, terribly high.. I can understand people doing that.. but ironically, we ultimately found out that it was staged anyway, it was not real. It was completely staged by the government." Reviewing the divergent narratives on the identity of the self-immolation victims, historian David Ownby concluded that "although the arguments of Falun Gong practitioners seem cogent, it is very difficult to arrive at a final judgment about the self-immolation. ... there are desperate people in China (and elsewhere) who will do anything for money (which would go to their families in this case, one supposes, unless the authorities had promised to rescue them before the flames could do harm). Or the entire event could have been staged. But it seems just as possible that those who set themselves on fire might have been new or unschooled Falun Gong practitioners, had discovered and practised Falun Gong on their own (and badly) in the post-suppression period, and, for whatever reason, decided to make the ultimate sacrifice." Other human rights activists speculated that the five who set themselves on fire did so to protest the government's crackdown on Falun Gong. Francesco Sisci, Asia editor of La Stampa, supported the possibility that the self-immolators were Falun Gong practitioners, writing in the Asia Times that "no one believed that the government could have paid a mother to torch herself and her daughter, or that she was so loyal to the Communist Party that she pretended to be a Falungong member and kill herself and her only daughter, even if Falungong master Li Hongzhi forbade suicide ..." In Sisci's view, Chinese officials made a mistake by arresting foreign journalists on Tiananmen —"independently filmed news footage of the proceedings could have been the best proof of Falungong madness. Instead, when the government reported the episode, it looked like propaganda." Time also speculated that the "lack of solidarity" in Falun Gong was contributing to the sense of desperation of mainland Chinese practitioners who may feel out of touch with the exiled leadership. Some observers have speculated that if the participants were Falun Gong practitioners, they may have resorted to self-immolation in response to the publication of a new scripture by Li Hongzhi released on 1 January 2001, "Beyond the Limits of Forbearance". An article authored by a collection of mainland Chinese Falun Gong practitioners and published on the main Chinese-language Falun Gong website noted that the scripture had confused both among Falun Gong practitioners and "in society," and that some people wondered whether Falun Gong would resort to violence to resist persecution. The authors wrote that this would not occur, as violence would be both counterproductive and contrary to the practice's core teachings. A Falun Gong spokesperson clarified that the new scripture meant it was time to "bring truth to light" about human rights abuses committed by the Chinese government. David Ownby wrote that he found the brief message to be "difficult to interpret": on its surface, the scripture resembled a "call to arms" against what Li described as "evil beings who no longer have any human nature or righteous thoughts." Yet Ownby said no practitioners he talked to had seen the scripture as a "green light" for violent action. Instead, practitioners had interpreted it to mean exactly the opposite, that they could non-violently resist suppression without guilt; they could stop "simply surrendering to the police at the first moment of a confrontation. They could run away, they could organize, they were, in a word, free of whatever constraints the necessity to "forbear" had previously placed upon them." == Aftermath ==

Media campaign and public opinion The state media coverage of the event resulted in increased support for the Party's persecution efforts against Falun Gong, and eroded public sympathy for the group. Time reported that before the self-immolation incident, many Chinese had felt that Falun Gong posed no real threat, and that the state's persecution had gone too far. After the event, however, China's media campaign against Falun Gong gained significant traction. One western diplomat commented that the public changed from sympathising with Falun Gong to siding with the Government, popular consensus seemingly shifted by human-interest stories and accounts of rehabilitation efforts of former practitioners. Østergaard believes that, in retrospect, the New Year scripture was Li's greatest gift to the state, as the self-immolations marked a turning point which ended domestic support for the movement. The self-immolation incident was given prominent coverage in the official Chinese media, which analysts say took a propagandistic line. According to Philip Pan, the Communist Party "launched an all-out campaign to use the incident to prove its claim that Falun Gong is a dangerous cult, and to turn public opinion in China and abroad against the group ... Every morning and night, the state-controlled media carry fresh attacks against Falun Gong and its U.S.-based leader, Li Hongzhi." In China's schools, regular anti-Falun Gong classes were scheduled. Continued reports of self-immolation On February 16, 2001, another self-immolation was attributed to Falun Gong. Tan Yihui, a 25-year-old shoeshiner from Hunan province, immolated himself on a street in Beijing at noon, dying at the scene. The news went into broadcast the same day in the 7 p.m. local evening news. State media reported that a six-page suicide note had been found, declaring a belief in Falun Gong and describing the self-immolation as a means to "forget about life and death and achieve perfection in Paradise". The news again drew suspicions among some journalists. Danny Schechter noted on the incident, "[a]longside a charred body an uncharred note is found allegedly claiming the victim did it to support Li Hongzhi's spiritual practice." Ian Johnson observed the state media "reported [the victim's] death with unusual alacrity, implying that either the death took place earlier than reported or the usually cautious media had top-level approval to rush out electronic reports and a televised dispatch. The 7 p.m. local evening news, for example, had a filmed report from Mr. Tan's hometown of Changde, a small city in Hunan province. Most reports for the evening news are vetted by noon, so the daily broadcast rarely carries reports from the same day, let alone an event that happened at noon and involved satellite feeds from relatively remote parts of the country." According to China Daily, on July 1, Luo Guili immolated himself in the city of Nanning, dying the following day from his injuries. Violence and re-education The Washington Post reported that Chinese authorities benefited from the turn in public opinion against Falun Gong that followed the self-immolation, seizing on the opportunity to sanction "the systematic use of violence against the group." According to the Post, authorities "established a network of brainwashing classes and embarked on a painstaking effort to weed out followers neighbourhood by neighbourhood and workplace by workplace." According to sources, "reeducation" tactics employed included beatings, shocks with electric truncheons, and intensive anti-Falun Gong study classes. According to Freedom House, in the year following the incident, the scale of imprisonment, torture, and deaths of Falun Gong practitioners in custody increased significantly. According to Freedom House, "months of relentless propaganda succeeded in turning public opinion against the group. Over the next year, the scale of imprisonment, torture, and even deaths of Falun Gong practitioners from abuse in custody increased dramatically." According to Human Rights Watch, practitioners may have concluded "the protests had outlived their usefulness for demonstrating Chinese abuses or for informing an overseas audience of Falungong's harmlessness." Liu Chengjun, a Falun Gong practitioner who hacked into the satellite feed, was arrested and sentenced to prison, where he died 21 months later, allegedly tortured to death. The remaining five individuals behind the television hijacking were also imprisoned, and all have reportedly died or been tortured to death in custody. Wang Jindong went on a hunger strike, and his wife and daughter were taken to a reform camp. They were imprisoned in their home province of Henan. In January 2005, the Associated Press reported that the sentences of three of those involved had been reduced for good behaviour and rehabilitation efforts. Liu Yunfang's life sentence was reduced to 19 years, Wang Jindong's 15-year sentence was reduced to 12½ years while Xue Hongjun's 10-year sentence was reduced to eight years. Additionally, two other self-immolation participants, Hao Huijun and Chen Guo, as well as Wang Jindong's wife and daughter, had been released from custody. who stated that he would spent over $2,000,000 on their medical procedures to restore the women's faces to approximately 80% of their original state. A few dozen Falun Gong practitioners organised a protest at a public speaking event in New York City, where Hao Huijun and Chen Guo condemned Falun Gong as a cult, calling the two "propaganda tools of the Chinese government". The film Return - Chen Guo before and after plastic surgery () documents Chen Guo's life after the incident. In January 2016, the film was subject of a symposium at the Central Conservatory of Music, where Chen Guo was formerly a student. == References ==