Tiananmen Square Massacre

On the eve of the 21st anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, three former leaders of the pro-democracy demonstrations gathered Thursday night in Falls Church, Va., to share their memories and experiences since 1989.

Capt. Xiong Yan, Chai Ling and the Rev. Bob Fu were icons of the movement in China. Each remembers leading a group of students into the square, united by the "human spirit yearning for freedom," Mr. Fu said during a prayer service sponsored by China Aid at the History Sanctuary.

Several hundred civilians have been shot dead by the Chinese army during a bloody military operation to crush a democratic protest in Peking's (Beijing) Tiananmen Square.

Tanks rumbled through the capital's streets late on 3 June as the army moved into the square from several directions, randomly firing on unarmed protesters.

The Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, referred to in much of the world as the Tiananmen Square massacre and in the People's Republic of China (PRC) as the June Fourth Incident (officially to avoid confusion with two prior Tiananmen Square protests), were a series of demonstrations in and near Tiananmen Square in Beijing in the PRC beginning on 14 April 1989. Led mainly by students and intellectuals, the protests occurred in a year that saw the collapse of a number of communist governments around the world. An intelligence report received by the Soviet politburo estimated that 3,000 protesters were killed, according to a document found in the Soviet archive.