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In the interview, hosted by Fareed Zakaria on Sept. 23, Wen fielded some tough questions on China’s human rights record, Internet censorship, the Dalai Lama and the Tibet issue, the Tiananmen Square incident of 1989 and the current financial crisis. While Wen said that he would tell the truth, in reality he repeated official positions on most sensitive issues. Even so, China’s domestic media choose to censor a large part of his interview with the exception of his response to the U.S. financial crisis.
Although Wen told Zakaria that he was being interviewed not only as a statesman but also as a common person, it is surprising that the common people in China were denied the right to hear what Wen had to say. It is even more surprising given the fact that, among Chinese state leaders, Wen is considered to have a good public image at home and is given major media coverage at official meetings and events.
Internet users on the mainland can neither access the official CNN video recording of the interview nor video clips posted on other Web sites like the popular YouTube. However, some netizens in China got hold of a fully translated Chinese version of the transcript, which was then quickly circulated to others on the Internet.
Some others claimed to have watched the CNN broadcast through illegal set-top boxes and decoders that provide access to overseas TV channels through satellite signals. This, however, is illegal, risky and costly and not many locals have the resources to invest in it.
Unlike Wen’s past statement, “History has drawn its conclusion,” on the June 4th Movement of 1989, this time around he directly said that China needs “to advance political reform,” in response to the question, “What lesson did you take from your experiences in dealing with that problem in 1989?”
Before the question was asked, a famous photo of Wen at Tiananmen Square was displayed, showing him with Zhao Ziyang, who was general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party at the time.
Wen was serving as director of the General Office of the CCP Central Committee and was the youngest among the CCP leaders. That historic photo with Zhao was taken in the early morning of May 20, 1989, when Zhao apologized to students and begged them to go home.
That turned out to be Zhao’s last public appearance, as five hours later, Beijing imposed martial law and Zhao was kept under house arrest until his death in January 2005. Wen, however, remained in office.
That photo is still available online. Some viewers of the CNN show thought that Wen appeared to be slightly shaken on seeing the photo during the interview. With several seconds of silence in the beginning, Wen said that along with economic reforms, China also needed to advance political reforms.
“I think the core of your question is about the development of democracy in China,” he said, going on to identity three areas that required progress, namely, improving the democratic election system so that state power would belong to the people, improving the legal system so that an independent and just judicial system could be achieved and increasing transparency in government affairs.
When asked to explain China’s restrictions on the Internet, Wen said that China presently has over 200 million Internet users, and that many people, even from the West, recognize the freedom of the Internet in China.
Moreover, Wen said that his government valued human rights. He said the Beijing Olympics were testimony to the fact that China was more open and that freedom of speech and of news media coverage were guaranteed.
Although before the interview officially began Wen said that he would answer questions truthfully and from the bottom of his heart, and Zakaria said that the interview was the most open and frank he had seen or read with Chinese leaders, not many Chinese seemed to buy their comments.
“There was nothing new in Wen’s statements on democracy and it just did not meet the reality of today’s China,” said Li Hongkuan, a pro-democracy Chinese critic based in the United States. Moreover, the fact that China’s official media left out Wen’s remarks on political reforms reflects the resistance of Chinese authorities to democracy, Li said.
Sun Wenguang, a retired professor from China’s Shandong University, disagreed with Wen’s comment, “Socialism as I understand it is a system of democracy. Without democracy, there is no socialism.” Sun criticized it as ridiculous and high-handed. A basic concept of socialism is the practice of public ownership, Sun said.
Wen’s comment that a democracy should ensure the people's right to democratic elections and their role in decision making could be another reason why the official Chinese media did not air the full interview.
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