Saxonian News (Radebeul, Germany): Early Dismissal from School for a State Visit

A huge contingent of police and security officers and security forces accompanied Jiang Zemin during his tour of the Meissen Porcelain Works. In addition to scuffles between police and demonstrators, the city experienced massive traffic jams.

By Petra Alexander-Buhl

April 12, 2002

A police helicopter circled overhead. Gawkers were glued to restraining barriers along Rauhentalstrasse. A young boy braked his bicycle, tires squealing. Immediately three police officers turned toward him. Walkie-talkies crackled. An official checks his video camera. At 3:20 P.M., a bus arrives at the manufacturing plant, disgorging fifty children who wave German and Chinese flags. A Chinese army soldier in olive green uniform garb stands forlorn among men in dark suits. This is the wait for China's President. Police close the B6 (Interstate highway 6), Post Street and Neumarkt (New Market).

Shortly after 3:30 P.M., thunderous motorcycle police escorts turns into Talstrasse. While the children wave their flags, two plainclothes officers wearing jeans, leather jackets and baseball caps push a young Chinese man and woman into the entry corridor of a house. Police patrols yank at Falun Gong demonstrators' red-and-yellow scarves and banners and tear them from them[... ] Each demonstrator is escorted away, one-on-one. Later on the Chinese woman tells us that she wanted her banner to be an appeal to Jiang Zemin, to allow the Falun Gong meditation system to be practiced in China.

"According to German law, freedom of expression is guaranteed in Germany. How come I was not allowed to avail myself of that? I carried no weapons!" She declines to state her name.

The onlookers don't get to see much of Jiang Zemin. A scant two-dozen limousines with darkened windows arrive, as well as an aid car and also a mini bus with blackened windows. Jiang's bodyguards and members of his secret service burst from the limousines and surround their chief. The president disappears at a fast clip into the factory. He makes his rounds, looks over the shoulder of a porcelain painter who is painting a floor vase and is presented with a vase adorned with a "Red Royal Dragon." [...]

At 4:19 P.M. the Chinese "wagon train" is moving once more. Ben, Lydia and Ren from the Neumarkt School are disappointed. Although they were dismissed from school one hour early because buses to the outlying areas during this afternoon were canceled, they had expected something completely different. "Well, this president wore a black suit and wore black glasses, but one could not really see him. The best part was the motorcycles. They simply whistled through here," the three excitedly said.