Chinese dissident Wang Dan, who led the 1989 pro-democracy student movement, said Beijing police intimidated his family after he called for Chinese President Xi Jinping to step down.

Now in exile in the United States, Wang said on his Facebook page on Monday that police turned up at their parents’ home and warned his sister not to be critical of Xi.

Wang was one of the student leaders who led the movement that was later crushed by the Chinese military in a June 4, 1989, crackdown believed to have killed thousands of people.

“My parents were not at home when four officers came,” he wrote in his post. “But my sister was told I should not pass criticism on Xi Jinping. It was obvious that they wanted my sister to tell me.

“In the past six to seven years, they had been watching quietly and never shown up at the door to make any accusations … This incident was probably about my campaign against Xi.”

He pointed to poet Lu Yang, a native of Shandong province who was recently arrested after he called for a regime change in China.

“He has been arrested for making the same call [for Xi to step down]. It means that Xi is indeed under pressure to step down or sees a risk of it happening, otherwise his subordinates would not have bothered,” he said.

Lu, whose real name is Zhang Guiqi, was arrested in May after posting a video in which he wrote in calligraphy the slogan: “Xi Jinping must step down and the Chinese communist regime must end.”

In the video, which went viral on the internet, the poet also described Beijing as an “evil authoritarian” regime and called for liberty and democracy after the current government was overthrown. Lu’s wife confirmed that he had been apprehended for subversion of state power.

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