China Lists ‘Most Wanted’ but Invites Tourists Back : 21 Leaders of Uprising Are Sought

State-run television and radio today broadcast a “most wanted” list of 21 top student leaders of the pro-democracy movement who have fled underground, and it urged the nation’s citizens to turn them in to police.

At the same time, Chinese officials encouraged foreign businessmen who fled the country for fear of army violence to return and invited tourists back.

State television showed pictures of the wanted students, among them Wang Dan and Wuerkaixi, the most influential of the movement’s leaders who at the height of the crisis had a televised clash with hard-line Premier Li Peng.

By issuing the list, authorities admitted that the activists had escaped the security dragnet set up after the forceful crushing of the movement for a freer China.

Orders Issued

Orders have been issued for their arrest, a television news reader said, and anyone seeing them should turn them in to authorities.

A Public Security Ministry order said:

“After receiving this arrest warrant, police in every province and region on railways, airlines, highways and border posts must immediately deploy units to arrest them and stop them escaping from the country.”

Detailed descriptions of all 21 student activists followed, beginning with Wang, Wuerkaixi, Liu Gang and Chai Ling, a woman who since the army crackdown smuggled out an emotional tape recording describing the bloodshed.

Premier Li, in a hard-line speech to the State Council, or cabinet, said what had started as a student protest in Beijing had degenerated into a counterrevolutionary rebellion.

Li said clearing Tian An Men Square of demonstrators was an initial victory. “Now the remaining task in front of us is to restore order and attack the counterrevolutionary elements.”

Outsiders Warned

“We hope that countries who want to keep and develop friendly relations with China will look a bit further and not do things that harm the Chinese people’s feelings,” the premier said.

Li’s remarks seemed aimed principally at the United States, which has severely criticized China for the crackdown and which harbors in its embassy the nation’s top dissident, Fang Lizhi, and his wife.

Chinese officials, trying to minimize the damage the Beijing carnage did to the country’s image abroad, tried today to lure foreigners back.

“I expect all will be back very soon since security is now no problem for them,” Foreign Trade Minister Zheng Tuobin said.

The mayor of Tianjin, Li Ruihuan, said China’s “open door” policy would not change. He publicly pledged to protect the legal interests of foreign businessmen in the city and encourage their commercial activities.

Stressing the “normalization” of life in the capital, authorities reopened the Forbidden City, Beijing’s premier tourist attraction, despite the tanks, armored personnel carriers and barbed wire a few yards away on Tian An Men Square.

Newspapers carried a picture of smiling foreign tourists with similarly cheery soldiers on the Great Wall, an hour’s drive north and a must on any visitor’s program.

But most tourist hotels in the capital looked near-empty.

The Beijing Tourism Bureau said about 300 foreign tour groups canceled their visits in May.