Hong Kongers would once converge on Victoria Park and its surrounding Causeway Bay neighborhood to commemorate the events of June 4, 1989, often taking part in candlelight vigils. 

This weekend the park hosted a "hometown carnival fair" organized by pro-Beijing groups, while scores of police deployed in the adjacent Causeway Bay shopping district searched shoppers and quickly removed performance artists and activists

Four people were arrested on Saturday for "seditious" acts and "disorderly conduct", and another four were detained on suspicion of breaching the peace. 

AFP saw artist Sanmu Chen chant "Don't forget June 4!" before he was bundled into a police bus.

Discussion of the Tiananmen crackdown is highly sensitive for China's communist leadership and commemoration is forbidden on the mainland. 

The government sent troops and tanks to Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989 to break up peaceful protests, brutally crushing a weeks-long wave of demonstrations calling for political change.

Hundreds -- by some estimates, more than 1,000 -- were killed. 

For decades, Hong Kong was the only Chinese city with a large-scale commemoration, a key index of the liberties and political pluralism afforded by its semiautonomous status.

But the Victoria Park vigil has been banned since 2020, when Beijing imposed a sweeping national security law to quell dissent after massive, and at times violent, pro-democracy protests.

Wong, a 53-year-old who gave only her last name, praised the atmosphere of the Victoria Park fair but, when asked about the vigil, said it was an event of the past.

"Hong Kong is a different place now."

Erase memories

The Chinese government has gone to exhaustive lengths to erase the event from public memory in the mainland.

All mention of the crackdown is scrubbed from China's internet. On Sunday, officers were posted around Tiananmen Square, at times stopping cyclists. 

The British Embassy in Beijing posted the June 4, 1989, front page of China's mouthpiece People's Daily that showed a small report about how hospitals were inundated with casualties. 

"Within 20 minutes, censors have removed our post on Weibo, censoring the news as reported by the [Communist] Party's most authoritative news outlet," the embassy tweeted on Sunday.

Authorities also targeted Beijing's Sitong Bridge, where a protester had hung a banner calling for "freedom" in a rare protest last October.

Security was increased around the bridge, the road sign was taken down and directions on map apps did not work.

Hong Kong's most prominent democracy activists have either fled abroad or been rounded up since the passage of the security law in 2020. 

Authorities were vigilant in the weeks before Sunday, with police seizing a commemorative "Pillar of Shame" statue for a security trial and books on the crackdown removed from public libraries.

Former pro-democracy district councillor Debby Chan said last week police had called her to ask about her June 4 plans after she announced on Facebook she would hand out free candles.

'Face the consequences'

City officials have sidestepped questions about whether public mourning was allowed.

Hong Kong's leader John Lee maintained the public must act according to the law or "be ready to face the consequences".

Vigils will be held around the world, from Japan to London, where a reenactment of the crackdown will take place at Trafalgar Square on Sunday. 

In self-ruled Taiwan, which China claims as its territory, workers set up a small replica of the "Pillar of Shame" on Sunday in preparation for a candlelight vigil. 

"The history and the memory will not be wiped out easily," said Hong Konger Sky Fung, secretary-general of Taiwan-based NGO Hong Kong Outlanders. 

"I believe the spark is still in our hearts."

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