China bids farewell to its former president, Jiang Zemin

Sirens sounded throughout China on Tuesday morning, marking the start of three minutes of silence for former President Jiang Zemin, who died last week at the age of 96.

After the end of the three minutes of silence, the memorial service for the deceased began in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, according to the French Press Agency.

The memorial service was broadcast live on television, and it opened with a speech by President Xi Jinping.

And Jiang, who led his country in a period of profound changes from 1989 until the beginning of the third millennium, died on November 30 of leukemia and the failure of many organs of his body, according to official media.

Jiang Zemin took power after the suppression of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 and led his country to become a superpower.

The body of the deceased was cremated, on Monday, in Beijing, in a ceremony attended by the president and a number of senior state officials, according to the New China News Agency, Xinhua.