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Hu Yaobangi

Born in November 1915, Hu Yaobang joined the Communist Party of China at the age of 18 and became a close ally of Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. He became leader of the Communist Youth League in 1952 and Party chairman in 1981. He worked as General Secretary of the Communist Party from 1982 to 1987, when he was forced to resign after clashes with Deng and other party elders over emergent student protests. His death on April 15, 1989, triggered the Tiananmen Square protests.

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  • Amid worries that China is heading down another planned-economy path, son of the late General Secretary Hu Yaobang weighs in with a pro-market perspective
  • An ardent supporter of China’s opening up and market economy, Hu Deping says that a government-controlled rural cooperative economy must be avoided
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The Chinese government on Tuesday took a more tolerant stance to online censorship on the anniversary of the death of former Communist Party leader Hu Yaobang, whose death 25 years ago today helped spark the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests.

After the communist regime seized control of China in 1949, the government's various political campaigns purged tens of millions of people through executions, prison terms and so-called re-education efforts.

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China missed a golden opportunity for political reform in the 1980s and it is doubtful when the next one will come, says a son of Hu Yaobang, the widely respected late liberal leader.

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Twenty-five years after his death, Hu Yaobang is still remembered by many, even including some of his former foes, as one of the most popular Communist Party leaders for his pragmatic reform policies and humanistic, liberal-leaning approach.

Hu Yaobang, the late reformist leader, has been a sensitive figure on the mainland since he was purged in 1987. But state media this week broke with tradition, heaping praise on the former party general secretary on the 24th anniversary of his death.

A statue of former Chinese Communist Party chief Hu Yaobang, a reformer whose death sparked the Tiananmen Square democracy protests, has been set up in a coastal city.