III 

116TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION S. RES. 221 

Recognizing the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre and 

condemning the intensifying repression and human rights violations by 

the Chinese Communist Party and the use of surveillance by Chinese 

authorities, and for other purposes. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

MAY 23 (legislative day, MAY 22), 2019 

Mr. GARDNER (for himself, Mr. MARKEY, Mr. RISCH, Mr. MENENDEZ, Mr. 

TOOMEY, and Mr. RUBIO) submitted the following resolution; which was 

referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations 

RESOLUTION 

Recognizing the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square 

massacre and condemning the intensifying repression and 

human rights violations by the Chinese Communist Party 

and the use of surveillance by Chinese authorities, and 

for other purposes. 

Whereas the United States was founded on the principle that 

all persons are endowed with certain unalienable rights; 

Whereas the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris on 

December 10, 1948, enshrined the rights of freedom of 

expression, assembly, and association; 

Whereas, after the death on April 15, 1989, of former General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Hu 


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•SRES 221 IS 

Yaobang, who was compelled to resign in 1987 for expressing support of students demanding political reform, 

thousands of people gathered to mourn him and demonstrate peacefully in Beijing; 

Whereas, throughout April and May 1989, peaceful demonstrations continued in Tiananmen Square and in an estimated 400 other cities across China, with total numbers 

of demonstrators reaching into the millions; 

Whereas, on May 9, 1989, prompted by discontent over censorship of the coverage of protests, more than 1,000 Chinese journalists signed a petition calling for freedom of 

the press; 

Whereas, by May 18, 1989, an estimated 1,000,000 Chinese 

citizens from all walks of life, including students, teachers, workers, writers and other individuals, gathered 

peacefully in Tiananmen Square to call for political and 

economic reforms; 

Whereas several Chinese individuals in positions of authority, 

including the presidents of 8 Chinese universities and the 

central committees of the Communist Youth League of 

China, called for the Government of the People’s Republic of China to accept the demands of the Tiananmen 

Square protestors; 

Whereas Chinese students abroad, including in the United 

States, organized rallies in support of the Tiananmen 

Square demonstrations; 

Whereas, on May 20, 1989, the Government of the People’s 

Republic of China declared martial law in Beijing and deployed troops of the People’s Liberation Army within the 

city; 


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•SRES 221 IS 

Whereas, on June 4, 1989, troops of the People’s Liberation 

Army, at the behest of Chinese Communist Party leadership, attacked Tiananmen Square to repress demonstrators, crushing defenseless protestors with tanks and firing on them indiscriminately, killing hundreds or possibly 

thousands of individuals; 

Whereas troops of the People’s Liberation Army also suppressed protests in other cities in China; 

Whereas protestors braved the brutal repression ordered by 

the Government of the People’s Republic of China, including by facing down a column of tanks sent to intimidate unarmed civilians; 

Whereas the Government of the People’s Republic of China 

dishonestly portrayed the individuals gathered as rioters; 

Whereas, in 2019, the Government of the People’s Republic 

of China censors any mention of Tiananmen Square and 

imprisons its own citizens who attempt to discuss 

Tiananmen Square; 

Whereas, in recent years, Chinese Communist Party leadership, especially under President Xi Jinping, has tightened 

its control over the lives of Chinese citizens and suppressed beliefs and activities it views as threatening to its 

rule, including through— 

(1) the ‘‘709 Crackdown’’, in which the Government 

of the People’s Republic of China, on July 9, 2015, detained and imprisoned hundreds of lawyers working to 

uphold the rule of law; 

(2) the imprisonment of Chinese dissident Liu 

Xiaobo, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and outspoken advocate for political reform, until his death in 2017; and 


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(3) the internment of 800,000 to possibly more than 

2,000,000 Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, and other Muslims 

in internment camps in Xinjiang; 

Whereas the 2018 Department of State annual Country Report on Human Rights Practices for the People’s Republic of China detailed the continued violations of fundamental freedoms, including the freedoms of speech, the 

press, religion, association, and assembly, by the Government of the People’s Republic of China; 

Whereas Congress has passed numerous measures articulating the longstanding and bipartisan commitment to 

support for human rights in China, including— 

(1) the sanctions imposed in response to the 

Tiananmen Square massacre under section 902 of the 

Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 1990 

and 1991 (Public Law 101–246; 22 U.S.C. 2151 note); 

(2) the United States-Hong Kong Policy Act of 

1992 (Public Law 102–383; 22 U.S.C. 5701 et seq.); 

(3) the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 

(Public Law 105–292; 22 U.S.C. 6401 et seq.); 

(4) the U.S.-China Relations Act of 2000 (division 

B of Public Law 106–286; 22 U.S.C. 6901 et seq.); 

(5) the Tibetan Policy Act of 2002 (subtitle B of 

title VI of Public Law 107–228; 22 U.S.C. 6901 note); 

(6) the Fourteenth Dalai Lama Congressional Gold 

Medal Act (Public Law 109–287; 31 U.S.C. 5111 note); 

(7) the North Korean Human Rights Act of 2004 

(Public Law 108–333; 22 U.S.C. 7801 et seq.); 

(8) the North Korean Human Rights Reauthorization Act of 2008 (Public Law 110–346); 


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(9) the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act (subtitle F of title XII of Public Law 114– 

328; 22 U.S.C. 2656 note); 

(10) the North Korean Human Rights Reauthorization Act of 2017 (Public Law 115–198); and 

(11) the Reciprocal Access to Tibet Act of 2018 

(Public Law 115–330); 

Whereas, on December 31, 2018, President Donald J. Trump 

signed into law the Asia Reassurance Initiative Act of 

2018 (Public Law 115–409), which condemned the 

‘‘forced disappearances, extralegal detentions, invasive 

and omnipresent surveillance, and lack of due process in 

judicial proceedings’’ in China and authorized funding to 

promote democracy, human rights, and the rule of law in 

China; 

Whereas the full, complete, and timely implementation of all 

relevant laws of the United States that address democracy, human rights, and the rule of law in China, including the Asia Reassurance Initiative Act of 2018 (Public 

Law 115–409), is critical to demonstrating the unwavering support of the United States for the fundamental 

rights and freedoms of the Chinese people and to providing full support for human rights defenders in China; 

Whereas the Chinese Communist Party has passed and implemented sweeping laws that provide the Government of 

the People’s Republic of China with broad authority to 

suppress the legitimate freedoms and activities of Chinese 

citizens, civil society, and international entities operating 

inside China, including— 

(1) the 2014 Counterespionage Law; 

(2) the 2015 National Security Law; 

(3) the 2015 Counterterrorism Law; 


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(4) the 2016 Charity Law; 

(5) the 2017 Law of the People’s Republic of China 

on Administration of Activities of Overseas Nongovernmental Organizations in the Mainland of China; and 

(6) the 2017 Cybersecurity Law; 

Whereas the Chinese Communist Party has used surveillance 

since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 

1949 to maintain tight political and social control; 

Whereas the ability of the Government of the People’s Republic of China to monitor its citizens and otherwise violate 

their fundamental rights and liberties has been accelerated by the proliferation of closed-circuit security cameras, the adoption of new technologies such as facial recognition, and the use of big data and artificial intelligence; 

Whereas the Chinese Communist Party has turned Xinjiang 

into a testing ground for these intrusive, Orwellian surveillance measures; 

Whereas the Government of the People’s Republic of China 

is promoting a state-controlled model of internet governance that is used to justify government repression of expression online; 

Whereas Chinese companies are exporting surveillance technologies to other countries with poor human rights 

records, and the Government of the People’s Republic of 

China is providing training to officials in these countries; 

and 

Whereas, despite this long and intensifying record of oppression by the Government of the People’s Republic of 

China, selfless Chinese human rights defenders continue 

their work and advocacy because, in the words of Liu 


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Xiaobo, there is ‘‘no force that can put an end to the 

human quest for freedom, and China will in the end become a nation ruled by law, where human rights reign 

supreme’’: Now, therefore, be it 

1 Resolved, That the Senate— 

2 (1) expresses its deepest sympathy with the 

3 family, friends, colleagues, and classmates of the vic4 tims of the Tiananmen Square massacre; 

5 (2) condemns the use of violence as a means to 

6 repress the legitimate aspirations of the Chinese peo7 ple to speak and associate freely, including to peti8 tion the government and challenge the policies and 

9 ideology of the Chinese Communist Party; 

10 (3) calls on the Government of the People’s Re11 public of China to invite full and independent inves12 tigations into the Tiananmen Square massacre by 

13 the United Nations High Commissioner for Human 

14 Rights; 

15 (4) calls on the Government of the People’s Re16 public of China to release all political prisoners, in17 cluding prisoners held because of their participation 

18 in the Tiananmen Square protest or actions pur19 suing reforms called for by the individuals gathered 

20 in Tiananmen Square; 

21 (5) calls on the Government of the People’s Re22 public of China to refrain from intimidating protest 


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1 participants who fled China and allow them to re2 turn to China without fear of detention or other re3 percussions; 

4 (6) calls on the Government of the People’s Re5 public of China to cease its current repression of the 

6 Chinese people, including of lawyers and activists 

7 who stand up for the rights of their fellow citizens; 

8 (7) urges the Government of the People’s Re9 public of China to cease the use of emerging tech10 nologies as tools of oppression; 

11 (8) calls on the United States Government and 

12 Members of Congress to mark the 30th anniversary 

13 of the Tiananmen Square protests, including by— 

14 (A) meeting with participants of the 

15 Tiananmen Square protests who now live out16 side of China; 

17 (B) meeting with others outside of China 

18 who have been blacklisted by the Government of 

19 the People’s Republic of China as a result of 

20 their peaceful protest activities; 

21 (C) supporting calls for accountability for 

22 the officials who ordered the Tiananmen Square 

23 massacre; and 

24 (D) supporting individuals who continue to 

25 call for reforms in China to further the freedom 


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1 of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom of the 

2 press, freedom to petition the government, and 

3 freedom of religion; and 

4 (9) calls on the international community to co5 operate in addressing the Government of the Peo6 ple’s Republic of China’s continued persecution of its 

7 own citizens, including the use of intrusive mass sur8 veillance. 

Æ 


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