Reformist leader Zhao Ziyang releases memoir from the grave

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Updated May 25, 2009 21:02:05

The posthumous and much anticipated memoirs of China's reformist leader Zhao Ziyang have just been published. During the 1980s, Zhao Ziyang was premier of the People's Republic of China and one of the architects of China's dramatic turn towards a market economy. But the struggle between reformers like Zhao Ziyang, and the old Communist Party stalwarts continued, especially in the lead up to the 1989 Tiananmen Square student protests. He opposed the government's bloody crackdown of the protests and by that time was already out of power and under house arrest. Zhao Ziyang spent the last sixteen years of his life, up until his death in 2005, in seclusion.

Presenter: Sen Lam, presenter of Radio Australia's Connect Asia programme
Speaker: Bao Pu, political commentator, human rights activist, and one of three editors of Zhao Ziyang's memoirs 'Prisoner of the State'

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