Two more Tiananmen memorials removed in HK
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HONG KONG • Two more Hong Kong universities yesterday removed public monuments to the 1989 Tiananmen protests in Beijing, following on the heels of the dismantling of a sculpture marking victims of the crackdown at another university earlier this week.
A 6.4m tall bronze "Goddess of Democracy" statue holding aloft a flame at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) had been removed from a public piazza just before dawn. The university said the "unauthorised statue" had been taken away.
The Hong Kong sculpture was modelled on a 10m white plaster and foam statue erected by students in Tiananmen Square in 1989 as a symbol of their resolve in pursuing liberty and democracy in China under Communist Party rule.
"I feel heartbroken and shocked," said Mr Felix Chow, a former CUHK student and district councillor. "This statue represents the school environment is open. It's a symbol of academic freedom."
Hong Kong had previously remained the only place on Chinese soil where such commemorations were permissible.
Hong Kong's Lingnan University also took down a Tiananmen massacre wall relief sculpture that included a depiction of the "Goddess of Democracy".
The authorities have been clamping down in Hong Kong under a China-imposed national security law that human rights activists say is being used to suppress civil society, jail democracy campaigners and curb basic freedoms.
The Chinese and Hong Kong authorities say the security laws have restored order and stability after mass protests in 2019, and that fundamental rights and freedoms are still respected.
Earlier this week, the University of Hong Kong dismantled and removed an 8m tall "pillar of shame" statue from its campus site that for more than two decades had commemorated pro-democracy protesters killed during China's Tiananmen Square crackdown in 1989.
The disappearances of these symbolic monuments at three universities in quick succession mean there are now hardly any remaining public Tiananmen memorials in the financial hub.
REUTERS
