Since the release of their father’s memoirs, life hasn’t been bad, says Adi Ignatius.

Question: How have his children fared since the publication?

Adi Ignatius: Since the publication the Chinese government has tried to react calmly and so they’re not coming out denouncing this. There was once an indirect editorial that ran in some Hong Kong papers that was clearly officially approved, but it mostly criticized Western media response to the book rather than taking on any of the book itself, or Zhao himself, or the contents of the book.

I think they’re trying to not inflame things. The family has made it clear that the tapes are real, the book is real, and that they are behind the publication, but they are trying to lay low and the government has as far as I know not made life worse for them since the publication.

Recorded on: June 19 2009