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Student leader Chai Ling claimed in a speech broadcast on Hong Kong television that she witnessed tanks arrive at the square and crush students who were sleeping in their tents, and added that between 200 and 4000 students died at the square. Ling was joined by fellow student leader Wu'er Kaixi who said he had witnessed 200 students being cut down by gunfire; however, according to Mathews, it was later proven that he had already left the square several hours before the events he claimed to have happened. Taiwan-born Hou Dejian was present in the square to show solidarity with the students and said that he did not see any massacre occurring in the square. He was quoted by Xiaoping Li, a former China dissident to have stated: "Some people said 200 died in the square, and others claimed that as many as 2,000 died. There were also stories of tanks running over students who were trying to leave. I have to say I did not see any of that. I was in the square until 6:30 in the morning."

In 2011, three secret cables from the United States embassy in Beijing from the time of the events were leaked and published by WikiLeaks, all of which stated that there was no bloodshed inside Tiananmen Square itself. Instead, they said Chinese soldiers opened fire on protesters in Beijing outside the square, around Muxidi station, as they fought their way from the west towards the centre. A Chilean diplomat who had been positioned next to a Red Cross station inside the square told his US counterparts that he did not observe any mass firing of weapons into the crowds in the square itself, although sporadic gunfire was heard. He said that most of the troops who entered the square were armed only with anti-riot gear.

Immediate aftermath

=================

Arrests, punishments, and evacuations

=================

On 13 June 1989, the Beijing Public Security Bureau released an order for the arrest of 21 students they identified as the protest leaders. These 21 most-wanted student leaders were part of the Beijing Students Autonomous Federation, which had been instrumental in the Tiananmen Square protests. Though decades have passed, this most-wanted list has never been retracted by the Chinese government.

On 17 June, two individuals were captured after exchanging gunfire with soldiers. The same day, a woman who had been visiting a Western diplomat at Jianguomenwai diplomatic compound was observed being arrested by plainclothes policemen.

The 21 most-wanted student leaders' faces and descriptions were often broadcast on television. Photographs with biographies of the leaders followed in this order: Wang Dan,
Wuer Kaixi, Liu Gang, Chai Ling, Zhou Fengsuo, Zhai Weimin, Liang Qingdun, Wang Zhengyun, Zheng Xuguang, Ma Shaofang, Yang Tao, Wang Zhixing, Feng Congde, Wang Chaohua, Wang Youcai, Zhang Zhiqing, Zhang Boli, Li Lu, Zhang Ming, Xiong Wei, and Xiong Yan.

Each of the 21 students faced diverse experiences after their arrests or escapes; while some remain abroad with no intent to return, others have chosen to stay indefinitely, such as Zhang Ming. Only 7 of the 21 were able to escape. Some student leaders, such as Chai Ling and Wuer Kaixi, were able to escape to the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and other Western nations under Operation Yellowbird, which was organised by Western intelligence agencies such as MI6 and CIA from Hong Kong, a British territory at the time. According to The Washington Post, the operation involved more than 40 people and had its roots in the Alliance in Support of Democratic Movements in China formed in May 1989. After the Beijing protest crackdown, this group drew up an initial list of 40 dissidents they believed could form the nucleus of a "Chinese democracy movement in exile".

The remaining student leaders were apprehended and incarcerated. Those who escaped, whether in 1989 or after, generally have had difficulty re-entering China up to this day. The Chinese government has preferred to leave the dissidents in exile. Those who attempt to re-enter, such as Wu'er Kaixi, have been simply sent back but not arrested.

Chen Ziming and Wang Juntao were arrested in late 1989 for their involvement in the protests. Chinese authorities alleged they were the "black hands" behind the movement. Both Chen and Wang rejected the allegations made against them. They were put on trial in 1990 and sentenced to 13 years in prison. Others, such as Zhang Zhiqing, have essentially disappeared. After his initial arrest in January 1991 and subsequent release, nothing further is known about his situation and where he lives now. Zhang Zhiqing's role and reason for being listed on the 21 most wanted is generally unknown; this is the case for many others on the list, such as Wang Chaohua.

According to the Dui Hua Foundation, citing a provincial government, 1,602 individuals were imprisoned for protest-related activities in early 1989. As of May 2012, at least two remain incarcerated in Beijing, and five others remain unaccounted for. In June 2014, it was reported that Miao Deshun was believed to be the last known prisoner incarcerated for their participation in the protests; he was last heard from a decade ago. All are reported to have mental illnesses.

Leadership changes

=================

The party leadership expelled Zhao Ziyang from the Politburo Standing Committee (PSC). Hu Qili, another PSC member who opposed martial law but abstained from voting, was also removed from the committee. However, he was able to retain his party membership, and after "changing his opinion", he was reassigned as deputy minister in the Ministry for Machinery and Electronics Industry. Another reform-minded Chinese leader, Wan Li, was also put under house arrest immediately after he stepped out of his plane at Beijing Capital Airport upon returning from a shortened trip abroad; the authorities declared his detention to be on health grounds. When Wan Li was released from his house arrest after he finally "changed his opinion", he, like Qiao Shi, was transferred to a different position with equal rank but a mostly ceremonial role. Several Chinese ambassadors abroad claimed political asylum.

Jiang Zemin, the Party Secretary of Shanghai, was promoted to General Secretary of the Communist Party. Jiang's decisive actions in Shanghai involving the World Economic Herald and his having prevented deadly violence in the city won him support from party elders in Beijing. Having put the new leadership team in place and recognizing his weakened position, Deng Xiaoping himself also bowed out of the party leadership—at least officially—by resigning his last leadership position as Chairman of the Central Military Commission later that year. He kept a low profile until 1992. According to diplomatic cables de-classified by Canada, the Swiss ambassador informed Canadian diplomats in confidence that over several months following the massacre, "every member of the Politburo Standing Committee has approached him about transferring very significant amounts of money to Swiss bank accounts."

Bao Tong, Zhao Ziyang's aide, was the highest-ranking official to be formally charged with a crime connected with 1989 demonstrations. He was convicted in 1992 of "revealing state secrets and counter-revolutionary propagandizing" and served seven years in prison. To purge sympathizers of Tiananmen demonstrators from among the party's rank-and-file, the party leadership initiated a one-and-a-half-year-long rectification programme to "deal strictly with those inside the party with serious tendencies toward bourgeois liberalisation". Four million people were reportedly investigated for their role in the protests. More than 30,000 Communist officers were deployed to assess the "political reliability" of more than one million government officials. The authorities arrested tens if not hundreds of thousands of people across the country. Some were seized in broad daylight while they walked in the street; others were arrested at night. Many were jailed or sent to labour camps. They were often denied access to see their families and often put in cells so crowded that not everyone had space to sleep. Dissidents shared cells with murderers and rapists, and torture was not uncommon.

Media coverage

=================

Official narrative

=================

The official narrative constructed by the Chinese Communist Party on 4 June Incident states that the use of force was necessary to control "political turmoil", and this also ensures the stable society that is necessary for successful economic development. Chinese leaders—including Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, who were general secretaries of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party—consistently reiterated the official narrative of the Chinese Communist Party when being asked about the protests by foreign journalists.

Print media were required to be consistent with the Chinese government's account of the 4 June Incident. The Chinese government prepared a white paper to explain the government's views on the protests. Later, anonymous people within the Chinese government shipped the files overseas and published the "Tiananmen Papers" in 2001. At the 30th anniversary of the 4 June Incident, Wei Fenghe, a general of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, said in the Shangri-La Dialogue: "The 4 June Incident was a turmoil and unrest. The Central Government took decisive measures to calm the unrest and stop the turmoil, and it is because of this decision that the stability within the country can be established. For the past three decades, China has undergone tremendous changes under the leadership of the Communist Party."

Chinese media

=================

The suppression of 4 June marked the end of a period of relative press freedom in China, and media workers—both foreign and domestic—faced heightened restrictions and punishment in the aftermath of the crackdown. State media reports in the immediate aftermath were sympathetic to the students. As a result, those responsible were all later removed from their posts. Two news anchors, Du Xian and Xue Fei, who reported this event on 4 and 5 June, respectively in the daily Xinwen Lianbo broadcast on China Central Television, were fired because they openly emoted in sympathy with the protesters. Wu Xiaoyong, the son of the former foreign minister Wu Xueqian, was removed from the English Programme Department of Chinese Radio International, ostensibly for his sympathies towards protesters. Editors and other staff at the People's Daily, including director Qian Liren and Editor-in-Chief Tan Wenrui, were also sacked because of reports in the paper that were sympathetic towards the protesters.

The restrictions were loosened after a few years had passed, especially after Deng Xiaoping's southern tour. Privately run print media then again flourished. Private newspapers increased from 250 in the 1980s to over 7,000 by 2003. Provincially-run, satellite TV stations sprang up all over the country and challenged the market share of state-run CCTV. The leadership also stepped away from promoting communism as an all-encompassing belief system. State-approved religious organisations increased their membership significantly, and traditional beliefs suppressed during the Mao era re-appeared. This state-sanctioned plurality also created an environment for unsanctioned forms of spirituality and worship to grow. To reduce the need for controversial methods of state control, Protestants, Buddhists, and Taoists were often used by the state as "approved" denominations to "fight against cults" such as Falun Gong, playing the sects against each other.

Foreign media

=================

With the imposition of martial law, the Chinese government cut off Western broadcasters' satellite transmissions such as CNN and CBS. Broadcasters tried to defy these orders by reporting via telephone. Video footage was smuggled out of the country, although the only network that was able to record video during the night of 4 June was Televisión Española of Spain (TVE). During the military action, some foreign journalists faced harassment from authorities. CBS correspondent Richard Roth and his cameraman were taken into custody while filing a report from the square via mobile phone.

Several foreign journalists who had covered the crackdown were expelled in the weeks that followed, while others were harassed by authorities or blacklisted from reentering the country. Some were reportedly beaten.

Some Western outlets withheld certain images from viewers; Graham Earnshaw, a Reuters correspondent at the time, stated that a "disgusting" photo depicting the burned body of a soldier hanging from a bus was not sent to subscribers.

Reactions

=================

The Chinese government's response was widely denounced by Western governments and media.

According to Suisheng Zhao, Asian countries generally remained silent throughout the protests. India's government under Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi ordered state television to minimize coverage of the events in Beijing so as not to jeopardize a thawing in relations with China and to empathize with the Chinese government. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) was the only political party in the world to pass a resolution supporting the crackdown on the Tiananmen Square protests, calling them "an imperialist attempt to internally subvert socialism, [which] was successfully thwarted by the CPC and the PLA." South Korea was in the midst of efforts to develop relations with the People's Republic of China and President Roh Tae-woo remained quiet in the aftermath of the crackdown.

Former United Nations Secretary-General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar expressed great sadness over the event. In 1992, he however stated that the crackdown had been exaggerated, and that he received no convincing evidence of widespread killing.

Cuba, Czechoslovakia, and East Germany, under the Soviet sphere of influence at the time, supported the Chinese government and denounced the protests.

Longer-term impact

=================

Politics

=================

As the party departed from the orthodox communism it was founded upon, much of its attention was focused on the cultivation of nationalism as an alternative ideology. This policy largely succeeded in tying the party's legitimacy to China's "national pride", turning domestic public opinion back in its favor.

Support of liberal reform and liberal democracy among intellectuals decreased, and support for conservative cultural politics increased.

The protests highlighted severe inadequacies in riot-control equipment and training among both the Chinese military and police. The PLA was not trained or equipped to handle riots, and the few PAP riot-control units that were dispatched were insufficient in crowd control. Since 1989, efforts have been made to create effective riot-control units in Chinese cities increased spending on internal security and to an expanded role for the People's Armed Police in handling protests.

Economy

=================

After the Tiananmen Square protests, many business analysts downgraded their outlook for China's economic future. The violent response to the protests was one of the factors that led to a delay in China's acceptance in the World Trade Organization, which was not completed until twelve years later, in 2001. Furthermore, bilateral aid to China decreased from $3.4 billion in 1988 to $700 million in 1990. Loans to China were suspended by the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and foreign governments; China's credit rating was lowered; tourism revenue decreased from US$2.2 billion to US$1.8 billion; and foreign direct investment commitments were canceled. However, there was a rise in government defence spending from 8.6% in 1986, to 15.5% in 1990, reversing a previous 10-year decline.

In the aftermath of the protests, the government sought again to centralize control over the economy, though the changes were short-lived. Sensing that conservative policies had again taken a foothold within the party, Deng, now retired from all of his official positions, launched his southern tour in 1992, visiting various cities in the country's most prosperous regions while advocating for further economic reforms. Partly in response to Deng, by the mid-1990s the country was again pursuing market liberalisation on a scale even greater than those seen in the initial stages of the reforms in the 1980s. Although political liberals were purged from within the party, many of those who were economically liberal remained. The economic shocks caused by the events of 1989, in retrospect, had only a minor and temporary effect on China's economic growth. Indeed, with many previously aggrieved groups now regarding political liberalisation as a lost cause, more of their energy was spent on economic activities. The economy would quickly regain momentum into the 1990s.

Student leader Chai Ling claimed in a speech broadcast on Hong Kong television that she witnessed tanks arrive at the square and crush students who were sleeping in their tents, and added that between 200 and 4000 students died at the square. Ling was joined by fellow student leader Wu'er Kaixi who said he had witnessed 200 students being cut down by gunfire; however, according to Mathews, it was later proven that he had already left the square several hours before the events he claimed to have happened. Taiwan-born Hou Dejian was present in the square to show solidarity with the students and said that he did not see any massacre occurring in the square. He was quoted by Xiaoping Li, a former China dissident to have stated: "Some people said 200 died in the square, and others claimed that as many as 2,000 died. There were also stories of tanks running over students who were trying to leave. I have to say I did not see any of that. I was in the square until 6:30 in the morning."

In 2011, three secret cables from the United States embassy in Beijing from the time of the events were leaked and published by WikiLeaks, all of which stated that there was no bloodshed inside Tiananmen Square itself. Instead, they said Chinese soldiers opened fire on protesters in Beijing outside the square, around Muxidi station, as they fought their way from the west towards the centre. A Chilean diplomat who had been positioned next to a Red Cross station inside the square told his US counterparts that he did not observe any mass firing of weapons into the crowds in the square itself, although sporadic gunfire was heard. He said that most of the troops who entered the square were armed only with anti-riot gear.

Immediate aftermath

=================

Arrests, punishments, and evacuations

=================

On 13 June 1989, the Beijing Public Security Bureau released an order for the arrest of 21 students they identified as the protest leaders. These 21 most-wanted student leaders were part of the Beijing Students Autonomous Federation, which had been instrumental in the Tiananmen Square protests. Though decades have passed, this most-wanted list has never been retracted by the Chinese government.

On 17 June, two individuals were captured after exchanging gunfire with soldiers. The same day, a woman who had been visiting a Western diplomat at Jianguomenwai diplomatic compound was observed being arrested by plainclothes policemen.

The 21 most-wanted student leaders' faces and descriptions were often broadcast on television. Photographs with biographies of the leaders followed in this order: Wang Dan,

Wuer Kaixi, Liu Gang, Chai Ling, Zhou Fengsuo, Zhai Weimin, Liang Qingdun, Wang Zhengyun, Zheng Xuguang, Ma Shaofang, Yang Tao, Wang Zhixing, Feng Congde, Wang Chaohua, Wang Youcai, Zhang Zhiqing, Zhang Boli, Li Lu, Zhang Ming, Xiong Wei, and Xiong Yan.

Each of the 21 students faced diverse experiences after their arrests or escapes; while some remain abroad with no intent to return, others have chosen to stay indefinitely, such as Zhang Ming. Only 7 of the 21 were able to escape. Some student leaders, such as Chai Ling and Wuer Kaixi, were able to escape to the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and other Western nations under Operation Yellowbird, which was organised by Western intelligence agencies such as MI6 and CIA from Hong Kong, a British territory at the time. According to The Washington Post, the operation involved more than 40 people and had its roots in the Alliance in Support of Democratic Movements in China formed in May 1989. After the Beijing protest crackdown, this group drew up an initial list of 40 dissidents they believed could form the nucleus of a "Chinese democracy movement in exile".

The remaining student leaders were apprehended and incarcerated. Those who escaped, whether in 1989 or after, generally have had difficulty re-entering China up to this day. The Chinese government has preferred to leave the dissidents in exile. Those who attempt to re-enter, such as Wu'er Kaixi, have been simply sent back but not arrested.

Chen Ziming and Wang Juntao were arrested in late 1989 for their involvement in the protests. Chinese authorities alleged they were the "black hands" behind the movement. Both Chen and Wang rejected the allegations made against them. They were put on trial in 1990 and sentenced to 13 years in prison. Others, such as Zhang Zhiqing, have essentially disappeared. After his initial arrest in January 1991 and subsequent release, nothing further is known about his situation and where he lives now. Zhang Zhiqing's role and reason for being listed on the 21 most wanted is generally unknown; this is the case for many others on the list, such as Wang Chaohua.

According to the Dui Hua Foundation, citing a provincial government, 1,602 individuals were imprisoned for protest-related activities in early 1989. As of May 2012, at least two remain incarcerated in Beijing, and five others remain unaccounted for. In June 2014, it was reported that Miao Deshun was believed to be the last known prisoner incarcerated for their participation in the protests; he was last heard from a decade ago. All are reported to have mental illnesses.

Leadership changes

=================

The party leadership expelled Zhao Ziyang from the Politburo Standing Committee (PSC). Hu Qili, another PSC member who opposed martial law but abstained from voting, was also removed from the committee. However, he was able to retain his party membership, and after "changing his opinion", he was reassigned as deputy minister in the Ministry for Machinery and Electronics Industry. Another reform-minded Chinese leader, Wan Li, was also put under house arrest immediately after he stepped out of his plane at Beijing Capital Airport upon returning from a shortened trip abroad; the authorities declared his detention to be on health grounds. When Wan Li was released from his house arrest after he finally "changed his opinion", he, like Qiao Shi, was transferred to a different position with equal rank but a mostly ceremonial role. Several Chinese ambassadors abroad claimed political asylum.

Jiang Zemin, the Party Secretary of Shanghai, was promoted to General Secretary of the Communist Party. Jiang's decisive actions in Shanghai involving the World Economic Herald and his having prevented deadly violence in the city won him support from party elders in Beijing. Having put the new leadership team in place and recognizing his weakened position, Deng Xiaoping himself also bowed out of the party leadership—at least officially—by resigning his last leadership position as Chairman of the Central Military Commission later that year. He kept a low profile until 1992. According to diplomatic cables de-classified by Canada, the Swiss ambassador informed Canadian diplomats in confidence that over several months following the massacre, "every member of the Politburo Standing Committee has approached him about transferring very significant amounts of money to Swiss bank accounts."

Bao Tong, Zhao Ziyang's aide, was the highest-ranking official to be formally charged with a crime connected with 1989 demonstrations. He was convicted in 1992 of "revealing state secrets and counter-revolutionary propagandizing" and served seven years in prison. To purge sympathizers of Tiananmen demonstrators from among the party's rank-and-file, the party leadership initiated a one-and-a-half-year-long rectification programme to "deal strictly with those inside the party with serious tendencies toward bourgeois liberalisation". Four million people were reportedly investigated for their role in the protests. More than 30,000 Communist officers were deployed to assess the "political reliability" of more than one million government officials. The authorities arrested tens if not hundreds of thousands of people across the country. Some were seized in broad daylight while they walked in the street; others were arrested at night. Many were jailed or sent to labour camps. They were often denied access to see their families and often put in cells so crowded that not everyone had space to sleep. Dissidents shared cells with murderers and rapists, and torture was not uncommon.

Media coverage

=================

Official narrative

=================

The official narrative constructed by the Chinese Communist Party on 4 June Incident states that the use of force was necessary to control "political turmoil", and this also ensures the stable society that is necessary for successful economic development. Chinese leaders—including Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, who were general secretaries of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party—consistently reiterated the official narrative of the Chinese Communist Party when being asked about the protests by foreign journalists.

Print media were required to be consistent with the Chinese government's account of the 4 June Incident. The Chinese government prepared a white paper to explain the government's views on the protests. Later, anonymous people within the Chinese government shipped the files overseas and published the "Tiananmen Papers" in 2001. At the 30th anniversary of the 4 June Incident, Wei Fenghe, a general of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, said in the Shangri-La Dialogue: "The 4 June Incident was a turmoil and unrest. The Central Government took decisive measures to calm the unrest and stop the turmoil, and it is because of this decision that the stability within the country can be established. For the past three decades, China has undergone tremendous changes under the leadership of the Communist Party."

Chinese media

=================

The suppression of 4 June marked the end of a period of relative press freedom in China, and media workers—both foreign and domestic—faced heightened restrictions and punishment in the aftermath of the crackdown. State media reports in the immediate aftermath were sympathetic to the students. As a result, those responsible were all later removed from their posts. Two news anchors, Du Xian and Xue Fei, who reported this event on 4 and 5 June, respectively in the daily Xinwen Lianbo broadcast on China Central Television, were fired because they openly emoted in sympathy with the protesters. Wu Xiaoyong, the son of the former foreign minister Wu Xueqian, was removed from the English Programme Department of Chinese Radio International, ostensibly for his sympathies towards protesters. Editors and other staff at the People's Daily, including director Qian Liren and Editor-in-Chief Tan Wenrui, were also sacked because of reports in the paper that were sympathetic towards the protesters.

The restrictions were loosened after a few years had passed, especially after Deng Xiaoping's southern tour. Privately run print media then again flourished. Private newspapers increased from 250 in the 1980s to over 7,000 by 2003. Provincially-run, satellite TV stations sprang up all over the country and challenged the market share of state-run CCTV. The leadership also stepped away from promoting communism as an all-encompassing belief system. State-approved religious organisations increased their membership significantly, and traditional beliefs suppressed during the Mao era re-appeared. This state-sanctioned plurality also created an environment for unsanctioned forms of spirituality and worship to grow. To reduce the need for controversial methods of state control, Protestants, Buddhists, and Taoists were often used by the state as "approved" denominations to "fight against cults" such as Falun Gong, playing the sects against each other.

Foreign media

=================

With the imposition of martial law, the Chinese government cut off Western broadcasters' satellite transmissions such as CNN and CBS. Broadcasters tried to defy these orders by reporting via telephone. Video footage was smuggled out of the country, although the only network that was able to record video during the night of 4 June was Televisión Española of Spain (TVE). During the military action, some foreign journalists faced harassment from authorities. CBS correspondent Richard Roth and his cameraman were taken into custody while filing a report from the square via mobile phone.

Several foreign journalists who had covered the crackdown were expelled in the weeks that followed, while others were harassed by authorities or blacklisted from reentering the country. Some were reportedly beaten.

Some Western outlets withheld certain images from viewers; Graham Earnshaw, a Reuters correspondent at the time, stated that a "disgusting" photo depicting the burned body of a soldier hanging from a bus was not sent to subscribers.

Reactions

=================

The Chinese government's response was widely denounced by Western governments and media.

According to Suisheng Zhao, Asian countries generally remained silent throughout the protests. India's government under Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi ordered state television to minimize coverage of the events in Beijing so as not to jeopardize a thawing in relations with China and to empathize with the Chinese government. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) was the only political party in the world to pass a resolution supporting the crackdown on the Tiananmen Square protests, calling them "an imperialist attempt to internally subvert socialism, [which] was successfully thwarted by the CPC and the PLA." South Korea was in the midst of efforts to develop relations with the People's Republic of China and President Roh Tae-woo remained quiet in the aftermath of the crackdown.

Former United Nations Secretary-General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar expressed great sadness over the event. In 1992, he however stated that the crackdown had been exaggerated, and that he received no convincing evidence of widespread killing.

Cuba, Czechoslovakia, and East Germany, under the Soviet sphere of influence at the time, supported the Chinese government and denounced the protests.

Longer-term impact

=================

Politics

=================

As the party departed from the orthodox communism it was founded upon, much of its attention was focused on the cultivation of nationalism as an alternative ideology. This policy largely succeeded in tying the party's legitimacy to China's "national pride", turning domestic public opinion back in its favor.

Support of liberal reform and liberal democracy among intellectuals decreased, and support for conservative cultural politics increased.

The protests highlighted severe inadequacies in riot-control equipment and training among both the Chinese military and police. The PLA was not trained or equipped to handle riots, and the few PAP riot-control units that were dispatched were insufficient in crowd control. Since 1989, efforts have been made to create effective riot-control units in Chinese cities increased spending on internal security and to an expanded role for the People's Armed Police in handling protests.

Economy

=================

After the Tiananmen Square protests, many business analysts downgraded their outlook for China's economic future. The violent response to the protests was one of the factors that led to a delay in China's acceptance in the World Trade Organization, which was not completed until twelve years later, in 2001. Furthermore, bilateral aid to China decreased from $3.4 billion in 1988 to $700 million in 1990. Loans to China were suspended by the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and foreign governments; China's credit rating was lowered; tourism revenue decreased from US$2.2 billion to US$1.8 billion; and foreign direct investment commitments were canceled. However, there was a rise in government defence spending from 8.6% in 1986, to 15.5% in 1990, reversing a previous 10-year decline.

In the aftermath of the protests, the government sought again to centralize control over the economy, though the changes were short-lived. Sensing that conservative policies had again taken a foothold within the party, Deng, now retired from all of his official positions, launched his southern tour in 1992, visiting various cities in the country's most prosperous regions while advocating for further economic reforms. Partly in response to Deng, by the mid-1990s the country was again pursuing market liberalisation on a scale even greater than those seen in the initial stages of the reforms in the 1980s. Although political liberals were purged from within the party, many of those who were economically liberal remained. The economic shocks caused by the events of 1989, in retrospect, had only a minor and temporary effect on China's economic growth. Indeed, with many previously aggrieved groups now regarding political liberalisation as a lost cause, more of their energy was spent on economic activities. The economy would quickly regain momentum into the 1990s.