27 years behind bars

The last known prisoner that left in the Chinese prisons for participating in the pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen 1989 will leave prison this October. Miao Deshun was sentenced to death penalty although that the sentence was suspended and now he is serving a life for burn a tank during the clashes with the army, when the Chinese government decided to use force to dislodge the thousands of protesters who had occupied in a peacefully way the square shape for months.

Miao had been 27 years behind bars and his sentence has been reduced three times; he entered in prison when he was 25 years old and now, he’s 51. He will be free on October 15, according to ONG although the Chinese Justice has not confirmed the information yet.

He was one of the 1,600 detainees who received formal prison sentences. Despite being a misdemeanour, his sentence was so long because, unlike other prisoners, Miao refused to sign letters of repentance and did not carry out prison labours. In fact, he not even appealed the sentence when he was sentenced to death at first.

The prisoner hasn’t had any contact with the outside world for several years, he hasn’t seen his family for a decade because he asked them not to go to visit him and even, sometimes, he refused to meet with the people who go to prison for seeing him. In fact, one of his companions in prison said that Miao has "severe mental problems", including schizophrenia, besides being sick of Hepatitis B.

China punished thousands of people after the harsh repression of demonstrations by the army. In addition to the thousand who were sent to prison, much more were assigned to forced labour camps to be re-educated and to be labelled as "counterrevolutionaries”. Currently, the families of the victims continue to seek justice and compensation for what happened, but Pekin continues silencing the facts and subjecting to surveillance the activists and families every time that the 4th June approach, the day that tanks of the Chinese army entered the streets of Pekin and ended in  with dreams of democracy of the student movement.