The commemorations of the pro-democracy movement, authorized until the muscular takeover of Beijing in recent years, are now prohibited.
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A date not to be celebrated. Hong Kong police arrested several people on Saturday, June 4, suspected of having wanted to commemorate in public the repression of the pro-democracy movement in Tiananmen Square in Beijing, according to AFP journalists on the spot.
These journalists saw at least half a dozen people being taken away by the police, the majority in the evening, including activist Yu Wai-pan, of the League of Social Democrats (LSD), a political party in the authorities’ sights. Yu and two other LSD members arrived at the busy shopping district of Causeway Bay in the evening and stood in silence, wearing masks featuring crosses over their mouths.
They were immediately intercepted by the police to be searched, then released, and Yu was arrested again a few minutes later as he approached Victoria Park, a traditional place of commemoration of the bloody events of June 4, 1989. The police confirmed the arrest of an 80-year-old woman for obstruction of law enforcement earlier in the day, but had not provided any other arrest figures by evening.
The authorities had warned that any participation in “unauthorized meetings” Saturday would be punishable by five years in prison. They also cordoned off Victoria Park, the scene until 2019 of gigantic candlelight vigils in memory of Tiananmen. In the evening, many passers-by in the vicinity of Victoria Park turned on the lamp of their mobile phones, failing to light candles. The police summoned them by loudspeaker to turn them off, warning them that they were breaking the law.
Some people were stopped and searched for wearing black clothes, holding flowers or, in one case, a toy tank. Others left lit candles in phone booths or handed out small candle stickers to passers-by.