For The First Time In 30 Years, Hong Kong Declines The Commemoration Of The Tiananmen Square Massacre

Protest illustration (Chris Slupski / Unsplash)

JAKARTA - For the first time in 30 years, Hong Kong police have refused permission to commemorate the Tiananmen Square massacre. Some say that this ban is an effort to limit the wave of citizen demonstrations which have recently heated up again. However, the police dismissed this. They reasoned that this was done to prevent transmission of COVID-19.

The Taiananmen Square Massacre was an incident by the Chinese military on citizens calling for economic and democratic reform. The incident occurred on June 4, 1989. Since 1990, residents in Hong Kong have commemorated the day of the massacre.

As noted by SCMP, the Hong Kong alliance supporting the Patriotic Democratic Movement of China which organized the commemoration said that alliance members were still planning to enter Victoria Park to observe the situation. In addition, they also called on the public to join in online video conferencing and light candles all over the city as a form of warning.

Political reasons?

As proclaimed by the NPR, the attempt to reject the demonstration comes amid the controversy surrounding China's proposed national security law that could limit Hong Kong's autonomy. "Legal scholars question whether Beijing has the authority to enforce this law in Hong Kong?"

Similar thing was heard from the leader of the Tiananmen Square Movement alliance, Lee Cheuk-yan. He believes that the government is using COVID-19 to tackle the warning.

"We believe this is completely absurd and unscientific because everything is normal in Hong Kong. They are only using this excuse to suppress our actions," Cheuk-yan said.

However, the police argued that the ban on the permit for the action to be held the day after tomorrow was to stem the spread of the new corona virus. "Police believe the event will not only increase the participants' chances of contracting the virus, but also threaten the lives and health of citizens, thus endangering public safety and affecting the rights of others," the police quoted The Guardian as saying.