China's Communist Party has blocked former premier Li Peng (
Li's nearly 300,000-word manuscript, titled The Key Moment, details how important decisions and assessments at the time were not made by him as widely believed, the Yazhou Zhoukan said.
The former premier sought to explain how leaders in the central government were divided over what to do about the weeks-long pro-democracy protests in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, the magazine said in its March 28 issue.
Li, 76, finished the memoir last autumn and sent the manuscript together with dozens of photos to the Communist Party's top organ, the Politburo, seeking permission to publish it, Yazhou Zhoukan reported.
But Li was told it was inappropriate to publish the book for the time being, despite Li expressing willingness to revise its contents.
The weekly cited sources who have read the manuscript and are close to current Premier Wen Jiabao (
Li's manuscript highlighted an incident on April 22, 1989, when students gathered at Tiananmen Square, demanding a chance to deliver a petition to Li, the then-premier, in person, but Li failed to meet with them.
Li's memoir argued that contrary to public belief, he was unaware the students were told he would meet them and did not mean to ignore them, a move which made the students felt lied to and caused the rift between students and the government to widen.
The report could not be confirmed yesterday, but other reports, including the Writer Digest, had said Li, who retired last year from his position as head of the national parliament, was writing his memoirs.
Li is reviled for being the public face of the government during the 1989 Tiananmen Massacre in which tanks rolled into Beijing and troops killed hundreds of protesters and even bystanders.
Li is believed to have pushed for a bloody crackdown on the demonstrators and to have persuaded the aged paramount leader Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平) to approve it.
The book consists of Li's diary for a few months before and after the massacre on June 4, 1989 and recounts conversations with other leaders, as Li tried to explain the behind-the-scenes rationale that led to the decision to carry out the crackdown.
Li has already written about the Tiananmen incident in a book published last year, the South China Morning Post said yesterday.
In United will paints magnificent tableau: Li Peng's diary on Three Gorges, Li revealed he was admitted to hospital after June 4, 1989.
The Chinese government has been facing pressure from victims' families, dissidents and rights activists to reevaluate the 1989 incident.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of