Wang Dan (1968- )

Chinese pro-democracy activist, imprisoned 1989-93 and 1995-98 for his role in the 1989 pro-democracy campaign. He emerged in mid-April 1989 as one of the young leaders of the student pro-democracy campaign in Beijing, which was to end with the 3-4 June 1989 Red Army massacre in Tiananmen Square. Wang was freed in April 1998 on ‘medical parole’ and exiled to the USA.

A reserved history student from Beijing Univerity, Wang was the ‘thinker’ of the inchoate movement and had come into contact with Fang Lizhi through the ‘Democracy Salon’ seminars, which he had informally organized. Wang escaped Beijing on 27 May 1989, prior to the Tiananmen Square denouement, but appeared on the ‘most wanted’ list of 21 alleged student ringleaders, which was issued by the Chinese government on 13 June. He was captured in July 1989 and sent to the high-security Qincheng Prison, near Beijing. After spending four years in prison, he was re-arrested in May 1995 and sentenced to a further 11 years' imprisonment, in the northeastern province of Liaoning, for ‘subversion’. His release was part of a conciliatory move by the Chinese authorities designed to improve relations with the USA. However, according to Chinese government figures, more than 2,000 dissidents remained in prison for political crimes.