China “Accidentally” Tears Down Forbidden City of Beijing, Erects High-Rise Condos, Shops

A team of 11,000 demolition experts recruited from all over China “accidentally” tore down every brick of Beijing’s Forbidden City in a single night, according to Chinese President Wen Jiabio, who apologized to the nation for the mistake in an unprecedented hastily arranged news conference broadcast over Chinese television.

“We needed more parking space and housing for visitors to the upcoming Olympic games,” President Wen told the nation. “Somehow the demolition crew went to the wrong location. Before anyone realized their mistake, the Forbidden City had been razed to the ground.”

Originally constructed during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the Forbidden City covered 720,000 square meters of land, had almost 9,000 rooms, and served as the head of government for more than 500 years.

“We don’t know how this happened,” President Wen told the nation. “It was just one of those construction accidents you sometimes have.”

The imperial past represented by the Forbidden City had often been a “thorn in the side” of the Communist government started by Mao Zedong in 1948. Tiananmen Square, the site of a 1989 uprising crushed by the government, was viewed as something of an embarrassment to the current Chinese government in the days prior to the upcoming 2008 Summer Olympics.

“The site is really great real estate,” President Wen said, “and it must be used for the benefit of the people. The people need condos, not reminders of the imperial past. So maybe it’s all for the best.”

The Chinese government had feared that the international news media would return to Tiananmen Square and recall the events of 1989, but “that can no longer happen,” said President Wen. “We are partnering with an American mall-building company and hope to have a 1,000 shop mall, anchored by Nordstrom and Galleries Lafayette, on the site open in time for the Summer Games.”

President Wen denied that the crew of demolition experts were headed toward the section of the Great Wall of China nearest Beijing.