In a speech delivered Sunday from the top of a tank at the Tiananmen Memorial observance in New York City, the Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting (CUSIB – www.CUSIB.org) Executive Director Ann Noonan vowed that CUSIB will continue to oppose the annual efforts by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) to crackdown on Voice of America Mandarin, Cantonese and Tibetan radio and television broadcasts.  “We will continue to support journalism for media freedom and human rights,” Noonan said. CUSIB Advisory Board member Jing Zhang, who heads Women’s Rights in China NGO, also spoke at the Tiananmen Memorial event in New York City. (photo)
The Voice of America China Branch covered the demonstration.
VOA现场：中国访民联合国前持续上访


Video streaming by Ustream
Tiananmen Memorial Remarks
by Ann Noonan
Executive Director, Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting
June 3, 2012, New York City
 
As the world remembers this 23rd Anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre, I’d like to express some words of comfort for the Mothers of Tiananmen whose children’s lives were sacrificed during a student-led pro-democracy demonstration in Beijing in 1989 that attracted workers, reporters and many party officials to Tiananmen Square.
 
I cannot imagine your sorrow and suffering.  
 
At that time, the world watched the horrors of China’s government’s brutal crackdown.  We watched the Chinese people flee from the tanks and guns.  We will not forget.
 
The letter issued by the Tiananmen Mothers each year is an important reminder about what happened in 1989 in Beijing.
 
Their annual letter calls for a full investigation by China’s government leaders and urges China’s government leaders to account for the deaths.  Their letter demands compensation for the families of the victims of the massacre, and demands accountability from and punishment for those responsible for the crackdown and the tragic loss of innocent life.
 
Please be assured that Committee for U.S. International Broadcasting will continue to oppose the annual efforts by the Broadcasting Board of Governors to crackdown on Voice of America Mandarin, Cantonese and Tibetan radio and television broadcasts.  We will continue to support journalism for media freedom and human rights.
 
We will continue to support media freedom for those who advocate for China’s government to release all those still serving sentences for their participation in the demonstrations, and to end the continued harassment of demonstration participants and their families.
We will continue to support media freedom for those who advocate for China to protect the universal human rights of all its citizens; to release those who have been wrongfully detained, prosecuted, incarcerated, forcibly disappeared, or placed under house arrest; and to end the ongoing harassment of human rights activists and their families.
I pray that the souls of your children may rest in peace, and I pray that the power of justice will prevail.