Tiananmen Square gets the increasingly sinister Beijing makeover
Updated on 05 August 2008
'One World One Dream' reads the slogan at Tiananmen Square in Beijing. Is that an order?
It's not like you simply wander into George Square in Glasgow or arrange to meet your mates at The Monument in Newcastle. No, going to Tiananmen Square in Beijing is no longer a completely spontaneous experience.
It's the cops you see. They are everywhere. In uniform. Out of uniform. Tailing you. Watching you. And sceening you. Everyone entering this vast square has to go through an airport-style security check.
And many do not even make it that far. We surreptitiously filmed the police as they stopped and searched a Chinese man across the road from the entrance to the square.
His rucksack, emptied onto the pavement, given a thorough going-over by the white-gloved Sons of the Revolution. His offence was unknown and we were hardly in a position to inquire. Eventuallly he and rucksack were escorted into police transit and driven off.
The most obvious undercover plainclothes cops in the world trail around you. Many openly snapping away with their cameras.
One more statistic in the legions under arrest, detention, re-eduction, exile and so forth.
And all the while crocodiles of visiting western tourists snaked by this, quite oblivious, following the flag of their tour guide up ahead.
Once on the sqaure - the biggest in the world I am told - the whole surveillance procedure continues. The most obvious undercover plainclothes cops in the world trail around you. Many openly snapping away with their cameras. Uniforms are there too, watching to see if someone, somewhere, might do somethng untoward.
The whole place has been given the Beijing makeover with vast floral displays shouting the slogan ONE WORLD ONE DREAM. Is that an order? It begins to seem increasingly sinister here, on the site of the notorious massacre back in June 1989.
In reality the slogan here would more appropriately be ONE WORLD ONE DREAM ONE ARMED SECURITY GUARD.
And over it all large white doves of peace are prominently placed above the heads of the thousands who wander the square dawn to dusk. In the police state, nobody mentions the massacre.
It is all part of the message and most here are very much on that message. We were not sure whether or not we were allowd to stop and talk to people. So we did just to test matters. Of course everyone we approached simply wanted to say how great it all was for China and how great China was for it all.
But then, from nowhere, a man appeared with an unspecified grudge against his employers and the government in general. Off he went. His impromptu speech recorded by us and listened to intently by uniformed and plainclothes officers all around.
When he paused I asked bystanders if they agreed with this man that China was a nation of slaves with no human rights? My cameraman suggested this was not a good idea as the crowd melted away in embarassment.
We quickly spirited the tape from the camera and out of the square. But the police made no move either on us or on our dissident speaker.
Perhaps he had calculated correctly that he would be OK to speak. Perhaps the cops will bide their time and come and get him at a time of their choosing.
