Tiananmen Square, Anniversary | featured news

China blocks access to the term "Shanghai Composite Index" on some of the country's most popular microblogging sites.

In an unlikely coincidence certainly unwelcome to China's communist rulers, the stock benchmark fell 64.89 points Monday, matching the numbers of the June 4, 1989 crackdown in the heart of Beijing. In China's lively microblog world, "Shanghai Composite Index" soon joined the many words blocked by censors. In another odd twist, the index opened Monday at 2,346.98. That is being interpreted as 23rd anniversary of the June 4, 1989 crackdown when read from right to left.

Chinese security forces rounded up more government critics ahead of Saturday's anniversary.

The former Chinese leader told the military to be ready to “shed some blood,” according to an unpublished diary.