Officials at the Chengdu Evening News refused to answer questions about an advertisement it ran saluting the mothers of those killed in a bloody military crackdown on democracy activists at Tiananmen Square in 1989.
The one-line ad on Monday night read: “Paying tribute to the strong mothers of June 4 victims.” It appeared on page 14 of the paper on Monday, the 18th anniversary of the violent end to a seven-week pro-democracy movement.
An investigation was launched by Chinese authorities to find out how the advertisement slipped its way past censors.
A woman in the advertising department of the newspaper said she was not accepting interviews and was not authorized to release any information. Employees in other departments said they were “unclear” about the ad and hung up.
Phones at the Chengdu government, police and local Communist Party office rang unanswered Wednesday.
How can you censor something when you don't even know what it is that you're censoring? That's the conundrum that the newspaper official faced. They were given a cryptic advertisement that didn't specifically mention Tienanmen Square.
The sad thing is that most people around the world wouldn't get the significance of that advertisement. Indeed, few get the significance of the lone Chinese man standing in front of the column of tanks that was ordered to break up the demonstrations.
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