Students Leaving Beijing, Say They Will Spread Message in Countryside
By TERRIL JONES
The Associated Press
27 May 1989
BEIJING (AP) _ Yang Jianjun says it is time to bring the spirit of the pro-democracy revolution that has convulsed the Chinese capital for the last two weeks out to the nation’s countryside.
Yang, a junior at Liaoning Fuxing Institute of Mining and Technology in northeastern China, was one of thousands leaving Beijing Station Saturday to spread the word of the student-led protest in their home provinces.
"Participation of the people will help bring about a new government," Yang said after spending four days marching and chanting anti-government slogans at Beijing's central Tiananmen Square.
But, he conceded, "the conditions are really bad at the square. A lot of people are tired of living out there."
As he and others prepared to leave, hundreds of students were arriving at the station. Soldiers blocked many from leaving the station to go to Tiananmen.
Yang said he was not discouraged that the Beijing demonstrations appeared to be coming to an end, with only about 20,000 protesters remaining in Tiananmen Saturday compared to hundreds of thousands a week ago. Some 3,000 students started a hunger strike to push for democratic reforms and a stop to corruption by bureaucrats and Communist Party functionaries.
The fasting ended after a week, but a shabby tent city with miserable hygienic conditions has sprouted on the majestic square.
The largest demonstrations in the 40-year history of communist China saw millions take to the streets of Beijing in peaceful but raucous parades and the unprecedented sight of jeering marchers denouncing government leaders and shouting for them to step down.
"People from my school are still at Tiananmen, and many of us return to Beijing after going home to continue our movement," Yang said. But he added that the journey back and forth is "getting hard now with all the soldiers at this station."
Demonstrations have been reported in many cities, apparently led by students who returned home after participating in the Beijing protests.
"We have to tell the people to arise, including peasants, workers, intellectuals and others from every walk of life," said a 24-year-old student from Wuhan who asked not to be identified.
On Saturday, several dozen soldiers kept crowds of students in a waiting area outside the station for a long trip back by special train to Wuhan in central China. Several dozen more plainclothes soldiers wearing red armbands made a ring around the departing students, making sure they did not stray back into the city.
"Soldiers have blocked the exits to keep students from getting out (of the station)," said Li Xiongdong, a junior at Beijing's University of Science and Technology who was seeing friends off.
Guards scuffled with five students from Suzhou University earlier Saturday, tearing their shirts while hauling them away to be sent back to eastern Jiangsu province, Li said.
"If a big group arrives (from the countryside) the soldiers won't try to stop them, but if it's just a handful, they won't get through," he said.
Nevertheless students continue to arrive by the thousands daily despite a government circular ordering a stop to their arrivals from outlying provinces.
During the peak of the demonstrations, some 50,000 students arrived by train daily, according to Chinese newspapers. State-run radio reported 26,000 students left Beijing Friday.
Rail officials declined to speak with a foreign reporter about the situation Saturday.
Students are fanning out across the country to tell their story directly to the masses, who they say don’t understand what is really happening in Beijing because of selective reporting by the state-controlled media. Large demonstrations have been reported in most major cities.
“We have to tell the people to arise, including peasants, workers, intellectuals and others from every walk of life,” said a 24-year-old student from Wuhan.
“The goal is to push forward democratic politices,” he said. “we don’t want to overthrow the Communist Party, but we want democracy.”
Zhang Weilong, a freshman at Shandong Building Materials College, said he too was going to eduated fellow students and citizens about the activities in Beijing an plan rallies back home.
Railroad workers have allowed many students to ride the trains free to join the demonstrators at Tiananmen, but that too is to end. Loudspeakers at the Beijing station said that starting Sunday, all students would have to pay for their trips.
That was all right with Yang, the mining student from Liaoning. “Next time I’ll just buy a ticket,” he said. “That way nobody can stop me from coming.”
