Liu Yang (astronaut)
Liu was selected for the crew of Shenzhou 9, the first manned mission to the Chinese space station Tiangong 1, along with Jing Haipeng, the first repeat Chinese space traveller, and Liu Wang. Liu became the first female Chinese astronaut to go into space. The mission was launched on June 16, 2012, 49 years to the day after the first female space traveller, cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova was launched. During this manned space mission, Liu performed experiments in space medicine.
Forced abortion of Feng Jianmei
Several commentators have compared Feng Jianmei to Liu Yang, who was in the news at roughly the same time for becoming the first Chinese female in space. On June 17, the "Tea Leaf Nation" blog published a story entitled "Netizens Reflect As One Chinese Woman Touches Heaven, Another Hell". The story, focused on a widely distributed Sina Weibo post, features pictures of Feng and Liu side by side, and the blogger wrote in the caption "The stark contrast between the fates of [the] two women ... is the clearest illustration of the torn state of this nation." The post was quickly re-tweeted by famous blogger Han Han. By the time the government deleted both posts, the information had already been shared 70,000 times in the first 24 hours. "The International Herald Tribune" immediately picked up the story, stating, "The gruesome abortion incident was cast this weekend against China’s successful launching of its first female astronaut. The sad irony of the two women’s situations was not lost on Chinese netizens." Two days later, the "Global Post" published the story and commented, "leave it to Sina Weibo to point out what's important", explaining that the juxtaposition of the two new stories "[highlights] China's current troubled and contradictory state ... Some Chinese women get launched into space, others receive injections that kill their unborn child."