Liu Xiaobo – the almost forgotten hero of Tiananmen Square

 

Liu Xiaobo was a key figure of the Tiananmen uprising, and was awarded the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize. Yet few in China know his name, as the government continues to try to erase him from collective memory. Liu Xiaobo was a human rights hero and intellectual who kept watch at Tiananmen Square in 1989 to protect protestors from encroaching soldiers. In 2008 he wrote the Charter 08, a pro-democracy charter that led to his arrest. When he was awarded the Nobel peace Prize in 2010 while in prison, Liu Xiaobo became China’s Nelson Mandela or Václav Havel. Yet many Chinese do not know much about him.