several arrests on the eve of the commemorations of the Tiananmen movement

A 34th anniversary under tension. Hong Kong police preemptively arrested, on Saturday June 3, at least four artists or pro-democracy activists, on the eve of the commemoration of the deadly crackdown on the Tiananmen movement. The police announced in the evening that four people had been arrested “for disorderly conduct in the public square”, and for “acts for seditious purposes”. Four others are suspected of “disturbing public order” and have been detained for “facilitate the investigation”added the police, without further details.

For more than 30 years, tens of thousands of people have gathered each year in Victoria Park in central Hong Kong for a candlelight vigil in memory of the more than 1,000 peaceful protesters who fell under the bullets of the crackdown on June 4 1989 in Tiananmen Square in Beijing. But since Beijing imposed a national security law on Hong Kong in 2020, authorities have put an end to such gatherings.

Police were present en masse in Victoria Park and around the bustling Causeway Bay district on Saturday, searching people walking there. As this year’s anniversary approaches, authorities have repeatedly refused to confirm whether public commemoration of the event is illegal, saying only that “everyone should act according to the law”.