• China will on Saturday 2020/4/4 hold a day of mourning for those killed by Covid-19, like Li Wenliang, the doctor who sought to alert the world to the disease.
• People asked to observe three minutes of ‘silence’ from 10am as sirens and vehicle horns blast out across the country
• Flags to be flown at half-mast to commemorate the 3,322 Chinese killed by the virulent disease
China has declared Saturday a national day of mourning for those who died in the coronavirus pandemic.
Chinese flags will be flown at half-mast across the country and at embassies overseas, while all public entertainment will be halted for the day, the State Council, China’s cabinet, said on Friday.
At 10am, the public will be asked to observe three minutes of silence, during which sirens will blast out across the country and the owners of cars and boats should sound their vehicles’ horns, the council said.
Saturday also coincides with the annual Ching Ming, or tomb-sweeping, festival, when Chinese traditionally remember their ancestors.
While the event is usually a time for families to come together in large groups, Beijing has this year asked people to stay at home and pay their respects online to limit the risk of a fresh outbreak of infections. The day of mourning will be the fourth in 12 years in China, after events were held to remember those lost in the Sichuan earthquake of May 2008, the Yushu quake in April 2010 and the Gansu landslide in August 2010.
Meanwhile, the government of Hubei – the Chinese province at the centre of the initial coronavirus outbreak – on Thursday named 14 local people who died from Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, as martyrs.
Among them was Li Wenliang, the doctor who was detained and disciplined by police in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei, for trying to alert the local medical community via social media to the emergence of a new form of pneumonia he likened to severe acute respiratory syndrome, or Sars.
Li issued a warning in late December. Weeks later he contracted the disease and by early February he was dead.
His death sparked an outpouring of grief and outrage online as people called for greater freedom of speech.
China will on Saturday hold a day of mourning for those killed by Covid-19, like Li Wenliang, the doctor who sought to alert the world to the disease. Photo: EPA-EFE
Although Wuhan police later apologised to Li’s family and some of its officers were punished, the Communist Party tried to distance itself from the matter.
A team of investigators that looked into how Li was treated told state media last month that “some hostile forces” had tried to use the doctor’s death to “attack the Communist Party and the Chinese government”.
As of Friday, more than 1 million people around the world had been confirmed as being infected with the coronavirus, while nearly 53,000 people had died from Covid-19.
This Wednesday, the lockdown that was placed on Wuhan more than two months ago will be lifted, allowing its residents to start the long and slow process of rebuilding their lives.
Waheaven, an online memorial service, posted and then took down a webpage dedicated to Li, as well as section for coronavirus victims in Wuhan. The South China Morning Post understands that the pages were taken offline on the orders of government officials.
The website’s main page, which had displayed an image in “memory of the victims of the coronavirus”, has been replaced with one for “Ching Ming activities”.
Pages for some other doctors, such as Wuhan neurosurgeon Liu Zhiming, who died aged 50 from the virus in February, were still online.
The lockdown on Wuhan, the city at the epicentre of the initial coronavirus outbreak, will be lifted on Wednesday. Photo: EPA-EFE
Other projects were censored as well. An artist who launched a project online calling for the public to submit memorial designs for Covid-19 victims said he had been contacted by police and questioned about his activities.
In Wuhan, retired teacher Joanna Wei, 58, said she and her family would only mourn at home in line with the government’s guidance.
Her son-in-law lost his father to the coronavirus in January, and three other family members had been infected or were suspected of being infected, but had since recovered.
Wei said residential districts were still under lockdown, and only essential workers were given certificates to permit them to go out.
“Me, my daughter and her husband are living in three separate flats because of the lockdown. Everybody in Wuhan knows that the authorities decided to lift the lockdown on April 8 to avoid tomb-sweeping day. You can only tell your sorrow to yourself,” she said.
Wei said she usually went to Biandan Mountain in Wuhan, where her ancestors were buried, for Ching Ming to pay her respects.
“When the city was sealed off in January, I knew that we wouldn’t have a normal Ching Ming this year. The first thing is fear over the spread of virus. Now the grief is uncontrollable. I can’t imagine the flame of anguish and rage when people gather to mourn.”
Credit to Source: SCMP
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