But in 1989 things were very different when Deng Ziaoping, an elder in the Chinese Communist Party (CPC) was the de facto leader of The Peoples’ Republic of China.

Another of the leaders in the CPC was Hu Yaobang who died following a heart attack two years after being forced to resign by Deng. Hu was seen as a liberal-minded person who promoted free-speech and Deng’s treatment of him was believed by many intellectuals to have been unfair.

His death in April 1989 triggered a small protest by students demanding that the CPC review their official view of him.

After confrontations between students and police the protests grew larger. Deng accused the students of plotting turmoil in an editorial in the Peoples’ Daily and on April 27 fifty thousand students gathered in Beijing demanding that Deng withdraw the statement.

The number of protests and protesters steadily grew until eventually the CPC leaders ordered the use of military force to restore order in the city.

Soldiers and tanks were sent into the city and were soon confronted by the protesters. The resulting violence, much of it centred on Tiananmen Square, caused deaths on both sides. The government acknowledged that there had been a few hundred deaths while other estimates ranged between 400 and 7000.

Widespread arrests were made and access to foreign press was restricted and coverage controlled.

Charlie Cole was in Beijing at the time working for Newsweek. He saw the events unfolding from a room in a hotel overlooking the square after being assaulted by members of the Public Security Police who confiscated most of his film.

They inadvertently left him a few roles of film that they didn’t find, however, and he used these to shoot the scene from the window. As he watched, some of the soldiers opened fire on the crowd of protesters and the tanks began rolling down Changan Avenue. Then a lone figure ran out in front of them holding a jacket in one hand and a shopping bag in the other and forced them to stop or run over him. This was an incredible thing to do in view of what had just occurred.

But the lead tank stopped and tried to manoeuvre around him. He continued to block its path until finally members of the Public Security Bureau, China’s secret police, grabbed him and took him away.

The man’s identity has never been discovered but it is thought that he was most likely killed, people were executed for far less than what he did.

But the photograph appeared in Newsweek and hundreds of other publications around the world provoking an international outcry.

Charlie Cold later said “I think his action captured people's hearts everywhere, and when the moment came his character defined the moment rather than the moment defining him. He made the image, I just took the picture. I felt honoured to be there”.