Another Hong Kong performance artist has been stopped and searched by plainclothes police after appearing in Causeway Bay on the eve of the anniversary of the Tiananmen crackdown.
Artist Chan Mei-tung appeared with balloons – one shaped like a golden question mark – around 19:18 near the SOGO store. The store is close to Victoria Park, once the site of vigils to remember the dead in 1989.
The police asked to see his ID and checked it. When asked by reporters what the balloon represented, Chan said it was for a “proposal.”
Police then escorted her to a nearby MTR station, where she destroyed the balloon after police told her they were banned from the subway system.
Earlier in the evening, the friend of the artist performance Sanmu Chan was stopped and searched by plainclothes police after appearing in Causeway Bay. Chan later told reporters that he was displaying a red thread that was 6.4 meters long. The figure appears to be a nod to the hit date.
“It is abnormal that every time we say or do something, we are being monitored,” he said in Cantonese.
The Tiananmen crackdown occurred on June 4, 1989, ending months of student-led demonstrations in China. It is estimated that hundreds, possibly thousands, died when the People’s Liberation Army cracked down on protesters in Beijing.
HKFP has contacted the police for comment.
Mass vigils are replaced by the patriotic fair
Mass candlelight vigils have not been officially held in Victoria Park since 2019. In 2020, Hong Kong authorities denied permission for the annual event, which attracted hundreds of thousands, citing restrictions of the Covid-19 pandemic.
After Beijing imposed the national security law on June 30, 2020, the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of China’s Patriotic Democratic Movements, which organized the annual event, disbanded. The main leaders of the group are now faces a national security trial.
Since then, police have routinely searched and arrested members of the public, activists and artists on the anniversary of the coup and before.
This week, from Tuesday to Sunday, pro-Beijing groups are hosting the fourth edition of an annual patriotic food carnival in Victoria Park.
Last year, Chan Mei-tung was stopped and searched by the police for chewing gum in the same areaat the same time.
