Chu Anping (1909–1966?) was a Chinese scholar, liberal journalist and editor of Guancha in the Civil War era of the late 1940s. He is widely considered to be one of the most famous liberals in China. He was Editor of the China Democratic League newspaper "for intellectuals", the Guangming Daily, in the PRC era. Following publication of his article entitled "The Party Dominates the World", he was attacked by Mao Zedong in the Hundred Flowers Campaign of 1957 and purged during the Anti-Rightist Movement. He disappeared in 1966. He was father to Chu Wanghua, a contemporary Chinese composer based in Australia, and grandfather to Mark Chu, a multidisciplinary artist.

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Biography

On June 1, 1957, at the symposium convened by the Department for United Front Work of the CCP Central Committee, Chu made a speech entitled "Comment made to Chairman Mao And Premier Zhou," which stated that Mao Zedong had seen the "world [as the] party's". Both the government and the people felt the tremendous reverberations. People's Daily and Guangming Daily both published the full text the next day with banner headlines and in a prominent position. In January 1958, in the Anti-Rightist Movement Chu was labelled a "anti-party anti-people anti-socialism bourgeois rightist".

Disappearance

In 1966 at the start of the Cultural Revolution, Chu was persecuted and forced to attend several struggle sessions in August, then attempted to commit suicide but failed. He was then detailed for several days but soon released and ordered to return home. He soon went missing in September 1966. His whereabouts were unknown and it was believed that he either went into hiding, was either beaten to death by Red Guards, or committed suicide. There are several specific theories about his ultimate whereabouts. In 2015, a funeral was finally held for Chu in his home county, Yixing. Photographs and a book were placed in an urn and buried in a symbolic grave by his three sons. State-run media said it was not a moment to re-evaluate the past, and his son Chu Wanghua said “Today is not a sad day. Today is a day of commemoration and remembrance.”

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