El presidente chino Xi Jinping "prefiere la represión a la reforma", said this Tuesday secretary general of Amnesty International, Salil Shetty, after increasing arrests on the eve of 25 anniversary of the suppression of the pro-democracy movement by the Chinese army in Tiananmen Square.

In power since March 2013, a little over a year ago, Hu Jintao's successor continued to impose a strict ban to discuss the events of 3 and 4 June 1989.

Lawyer Tang Jingling, well-known human rights activist, is the last of a twenty opponents who will end up behind bars for criminal activity.

"Cuando el presidente Xi llegó al poder, nos prometieron una mayor transparencia", Salil Shetty explained in an interview. "Y por lo tanto, one would have thought that he 25 anniversary of the Tiananmen crackdown habría proporcionado una oportunidad única de hacer realidad sus promesas", he added.

"Por desgracia, we have confirmed that Xi prefers repression to reform", according to the head of Amnesty International, calling on Beijing to open an investigation into the Tiananmen events, a quarter of a century after this bloody episode.

China generally uses detention of dissidents before particularly sensitive dates, but this year, human rights organizations denounced a unusual increase of the arrests.

Within a month, about twenty of university students, liberal lawyers and activists have been imprisoned for these crimes, depending on the organization Human Rights in China (Human Rights in China, in English), based in the United States.

It is for the Chinese power "a way to draw the new red lines not to cross", explica Shetty. "Y como puede hacerlo con impunidad, no se priva", added the leader of the organization for the defense of human rights, currently visiting Hong Kong to attend the Tiananmen commemorations.

Among the victims of the wave of repression of this month, Lawyer Pu Zhiqiang and four other opponents arrested for attending a private seminar dedicated to the Tiananmen events.