New | German president slams communism in provocative speech to Shanghai students on his China visit

Germany’s president has condemned the illegitimacy of Communist rule in East Germany and lauded the benefits of human rights in a provocative speech to Shanghai university students on Wednesday.

China has been ruled by the Communist Party as a one-party state since 1949. Under Chinese President Xi Jinping’s administration, authorities have tightened control over academics, lawyers and the media, activists say.

Drawing on Germany’s history and his own life in the former East Germany, President Joachim Gauck – whose role is largely ceremonial – condemned “dictatorship” to students at Shanghai’s prestigious Tongji University.

“Most people were neither happy nor liberated,” he said of East Germany under Communist rule, according to an official English translation of his speech.

“And the entire system lacked proper legitimacy. Free, equal and secret public elections were not held. The result was a lack of credibility, which went hand in hand with a culture of distrust between the rulers and those they ruled.

“It was a state that, as part of the union of Communist countries dependent on the Soviet Union, silenced its own people, locked them up and humiliated those who refused to comply with the will of the leaders.”