Prosperity Can’t Erase Tiananmen: Op-ed by Wu’er Kaixi

Excerpt from a powerful op-ed by Wu’er Kaixi, Tiananmen student leader in today’s Wall Street Journal.

In the aftermath of the bloodshed in Beijing 20 years ago — when I first went into hiding — my mother had a stroke. It paralyzed one side of her face. I was 10 years in exile before my brother told me. I do not regret what we did in Beijing that year the Berlin Wall fell, when there was so much hope of change in the air, but the deaths have haunted me for 20 years, and I want to hug my mother and tell her: “Sorry.”

I can’t. The Chinese government will not issue passports for my parents. China will not allow me to go home. It is difficult to explain the feelings I have at this moment to a world that has come to see China as a responsible member of the global community — the motor of global economic growth, the miracle that will jumpstart global capitalism. But the feelings can largely be summed up as disappointment: disappointment that China’s “progress” has been so one-sided.

Read the full op-ed here: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124405068737681917.html#