Ding Zilin - Biography

Biography

Ding, born in Shanghai on December 20, 1936, was professor of philosophy at People's University in Beijing. Her husband, Jiang Peikun (蔣培坤), was head of the Aesthetics Institute at the same establishment.

Ding's seventeen-year-old son, Jiang Jielian, (蔣捷連) was one of the first to be killed. when the People's Liberation Army crushed the Tiananmen Square protests. Eyewitnesses had told her that her son was shot and was left to bleed to death on the night of June 3, 1989. He left the family home in defiance of the curfew, and was shot through the heart by riot police on the way to Tiananmen Square. He was rushed to the Beijing Children's Hospital, where he was pronounced "Dead on arrival".

Following her son's death, Ding said she attempted suicide six times.

In August 1989, she met another bereaved mother, and found a commonality within the self-help group, which continued growing. She formed a network of some 150 other families who had lost sons and daughters during the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, and this group became known as "Tiananmen Mothers". Ever since that day, she has been asking the government to apologize for the deaths. She and some others have faced imprisonment, house-arrest, phone-tapping and constant surveillance.

In 1991, after an interview she gave to ABC News, the government prevented her and her husband from carrying out their work or research, and were barred from publishing domestically. Party membership was revoked. In addition, she was detained for more than 40 days. She was forced into early retirement. Since her release, she was under close supervision by the authorities. Harassment continued when on September 9, 1994, she was arrested in front of the University and held by police for two hours, for having had published an article in the foreign media "hurtful to the people". Again in 1995, she and her husband were arrested in Wuxi on August 18 and incarcerated until September 30, allegedly on "economic matters", and were denied visitors. In 1996 Ding's husband was forced to retire early. Since February 28, 2000, she has been under 24-hour surveillance by the authorities.

She was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for her efforts.

In 2004, she and other Tiananmen Mothers were put under house arrest shortly before the 15th anniversary of the massacre to prevent them from holding any public memorial or protest. She was allegedly told by a senior official that a review of the June 4, 1989 crackdown was "out of the question." In 2006, Time magazine selected her as one of the 60 Asian heroes.

She has been collecting the names of the those who were shot dead by the People's Liberation Army in Beijing around June 4, 1989. At the end of June 2006, Ding was able to confirm 186 deaths through her own efforts despite repeated harassment by the authorities. However, it should be noted, that upon close inspection of the cause of deaths, not all individuals on Ding's list died directly at the hands of the army. For example, at least one of the individuals on the list had committed suicide after the uprising had been squashed.

She and her husband have been under house arrest as of May 24, 2004. On February 8, 2007, she won the Vasyl Stus "Freedom-to-Write" Award for her book "Looking for the June 4 victims". She was ordered to leave Beijing for a forced vacation during the 2008 Summer Olympics. Following the announcement that Liu Xiaobo had won the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize, and his dedication of his prize to those who died in 1989, dissident groups reported on October 18 she and her husband may have been taken into custody by police, and have not been seen or heard from for four days; their phones have been cut off.