Yan Mingfu, Communist Party envoy to protesters in China’s Tiananmen Square in 1989, dies at age 91

By JOE McDONALD
Associated Press

BEIJING (AP) — Yan Mingfu, a former top Communist Party figure who acted as an envoy to pro-democracy protesters in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square in 1989 and was forced out after the protests were violently crushed, has died at age 91. Chinese media say Yan died Monday of unspecified causes. He served as a Russian interpreter for then-leader Mao Zedong in the 1950s and ‘60s before holding a series of ruling party posts. Yan was a top figure under then-General Secretary Zhao Ziyang during the 1989 student-led protests. He expressed sympathy with the protesters and tried to persuade them to go home. After the protests were crushed by the party’s military wing, Yan and other leaders were dismissed.