THE day Premier Wen took office he stated.""Leaders should be closer to the masses."" His visit to comfort and talk with everyday workers in Tongchuan City, Shaanxi Province on January 1, 2005, where a few weeks previously a gas blast in the Chenjiashan Coalmine had killed 166 workers, was by no means his first. But it was the first time he publicly shed tears. In one household that had lost its breadwinner, Wen Jiabao embraced the victim's son and shared his grief. He later had a simple lunch of steamed bread and tea in a tunnel 1,300 meters belowg round as he chatted with workers at another mine in the city.
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