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| China's 60th anniversary stirs pride, also unease |
| Press Trust of India / Beijing Oct 01, 2009, 09:40 IST |
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To mark 60 years of communist rule China put together its biggest-ever military parade: hundreds of thousands of marchers, batteries of goose-stepping soldiers and weaponry from drone missiles to amphibious assault vehicles. Everyone else, though, was asked to stay home.
China blocked off its city centre closing everything from Tiananmen Square to the Forbidden City as it readied for today's celebration, asking residents to tune into the events by television.
Festivities surrounding the founding of the People's Republic will feature President Hu Jintao reviewing chanting troops, a flyover by domestically made fighter jets and tens of thousands of students flipping cards to make pictures.
Sixty floats celebrating China's manned space program and other symbols of progress will follow the military convoy along the parade route through Tiananmen Square.
The display is meant to underscore what the leadership calls the "revival of the great Chinese nation," and the plans stirred both patriotism and some unease at the pomp and firepower.
"China's international standing has risen in an unprecedented way. We feel extremely proud of the increasing strength and prosperity of our motherland," Premier Wen Jiabao said in a nationally televised speech on the anniversary's eve.
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