A lone man faces down a line of tanks: known only as ‘Tank Man’, his bravery during the Tiananmen Square massacre has been remembered at vigils in Hong Kong for decades.
That is until Beijing cracked down on events held on June 4, the anniversary of the massacre.
Earlier this month, Hong Kong’s High Court began hearing closing arguments in the case of two democracy activists, Lee Cheuk-yan and Chow Hang-tung, charged with inciting subversion for organising a candlelight vigil to remember Tiananmen Square.
Experts warn it’s a sign of China’s increasingly hardline stance and are concerned that the world is forgetting about human rights in Hong Kong.
From peaceful protest to massacre
No-one knows what happened to ‘Tank Man’ or his name.
On June 4, 1989, months of pro-democracy and freedom protests came to a head in Tiananmen Square, Beijing.
Under leader Deng Xiaoping, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) ordered an estimated 180,000 troops and police to enter with tanks and armoured vehicles.
Using live ammunition, soldiers forced their way through crowds.
Over seven weeks in 1989, students led peaceful pro-democracy protests centred on Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. (AP: Sadayuki Mikami)
Estimates range from hundreds to thousands of people killed.
Nearly 40 years later, the reverberations from that event are still being felt, as the Chinese government continues to stifle mention of the massacre and has cracked down on people in Hong Kong who attended events to remember it.
The photo of a man in front of a convoy of tanks became the defining image of the Tiananmen Square massacre. (Reuters)
Basic Law
Lee and Chow, two former leaders of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, have pleaded not guilty to “incitement to subversion” after organising vigils on the massacre anniversary.
If convicted, they face up to 10 years in jail.
A third defendant, 74-year-old Albert Ho, a former lawyer, pleaded guilty in January.
When the British handed back Hong Kong to China in 1997, Beijing promised that the “capitalist system and way of life shall remain unchanged for 50 years”, under what’s called the Basic Law, the document that forms the basis of Hong Kong’s constitution.
But, less than 30 years in, human rights and legal advocates have become increasingly concerned about Beijing’s crackdown on freedom of expression and approach to human rights in Hong Kong.
Andrew Witheford, from Amnesty International Australia, told the ABC that a national security law brought in in 2020 has been a key instrument for China to essentially undermine the safeguards and undertakings that were given in the Hong Kong Basic Law.
While mainland China quickly quashed any mention of the Tiananmen Square massacre, vigils have been held in Hong Kong on June 4 since 1990, with hundreds of thousands of people participating.
After huge and sometimes violent pro-democracy protests in 2019, Beijing imposed a national security law on Hong Kong in 2020, which was then followed in 2024 by a new national security law that granted the government more power to quash dissent.
“In 2020, on the pretext of COVID, the vigils were banned by the government and, since then, anyone turning up on June 4 has been arrested and subject to charges under the national security law,” Mr Witheford said.
Other Hong Kong citizens have been prosecuted over the past six years, including a group known as the Hong Kong 47, who were arrested in January 2021 and charged with subversion.
In November 2024, 45 people were convicted with jail terms ranging from four to 10 years.
Tens of thousands of people at a candlelight vigil at Hong Kong’s Victoria Park on June 4, 2014, to mark the 25th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. (Reuters: Bobby Yip)
Mr Witheford said the arrests were the latest chapter in a crackdown on peaceful vigils to mark the Tiananmen Square massacre.
“It was a landmark moment in Chinese history, people standing up peacefully demonstrating for their civil and political rights, and they were brutally crushed,” he said.
“And for Hong Kong, a society that functioned with these democratic rights and freedoms and free press for over a century, to have it taken away inexorably and quite quickly over the last 20 years, has been a bit of a blow to many, many people.”
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No more candles
Kevin Yam is a lawyer who grew up in Australia and practised in Hong Kong for 20 years until he was struck off for comments he made about China to a US Congressional hearing.
The Tiananmen massacre vigils held particular poignancy and significance for Hongkongers, Mr Yam said, because of Operation Yellow Bird, where, in the aftermath of the massacre, people in Hong Kong helped smuggle out people wanted by the CCP for their involvement in the protests.
But there are unlikely to be any commemorations this June 4 in Victoria Park, Mr Yam said, as pro-Beijing groups have, in recent years, rented out the venue to set up market stalls.
“So not only are they arresting anyone who is trying to invoke memories of [the massacre], not only will there be heavy police presence on and around Hong Kong, but just to be doubly sure they’ve got their own allies to book up the whole venue so that no-one can contravene them,” he said.
Human Rights Watch Asia director Elaine Pearson said the Hong Kong and Beijing governments were “weaponising a legal system they partly control” to criminalise the popular annual Tiananmen massacre commemoration.
“The Chinese government has not only refused to reckon with past wrongs — it is trying to erase them,” she said.
Chow Hang-tung faces up to 10 years in jail if convicted. (Reuters: Tyrone Siu)
In her closing submission to the High Court, Chow, a barrister who represented herself, argued that the “real core issue is whether the law truly forbids us from pursuing a democratic transition and defends the Communist Party’s perpetual rule”.
“In the face of the government’s abuse of power and arbitrary killings, does the law only allow us to swallow and wallow in our discontent but not to demand an end to such a tyranny?”
she said.
Mr Yam said cases like the one against Chow, Lee and Ho were reminders as to why the world must not forget what is happening in Hong Kong.
“It has implications for how Western countries, such as Australia, should think about their relationship with China,” he said.
“Because if China can breach and ignore an international treaty that’s signed in Britain over the status of millions of people, then why can we take their word on anything else?”
Pro-democracy protesters marched to demand universal suffrage in Hong Kong on July 1, 2014, the 17th anniversary of the territory’s handover to China. (Reuters: Bobby Yip)
Umbrella movement
The recent crackdowns are the latest assault on freedom in Hong Kong since 1997.
By 2014, hundreds of thousands took to the streets to protest Beijing’s plans to offer only vetted candidates for Hong Kong elections in 2017.
The mass protests, which came to be known as the ‘Umbrella Movement’, paralysed Hong Kong for 79 days in late 2014 and led to clashes with police and an eventual crackdown, under Hong Kong chief executive CY Leung.
Ted Hui, a former Hong Kong politician who was granted asylum in Australia, counts Albert Ho as a mentor.
Mr Hui and Mr Yam both have $HK1 million ($180,000) bounties on their heads for their return to Hong Kong, after they were issued with arrest warrants, which have been strongly condemned by the Australian government.
“I want Hong Kong to have freedom, democracy, and people’s rights respected,” Mr Hui said.
“I never imagined that I would never be able to even step on my homeland and maybe be in exile forever.
“It’s terrifying, and it’s unimaginable.”
It is unlikely there will be a candlelight vigil in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park on June 4 this year. (AP: Kin Cheung)
Don’t poke the bear
Advocates have been asking the international community, including Australia, to put more pressure on China regarding Hong Kong, including sanctions.
But while there have been many strongly worded statements raising concerns about Hong Kong, Australian officials have “never seriously” considered sanctions, Mr Hui said.
“It’s disappointing in a way, but the reality is reality, so we understand that it’s not the most pressing issue for many Western democracies, and the China relationship is complex, and they’d rather not poke the bear,” he said.
Human Rights Measurement Initiative East Asia spokesperson Patrick Poon, who was previously a court reporter in Hong Kong, said if the world wanted to do business with China, it should have to respect human rights.
“Remember the Tiananmen mothers who lost their sons and daughters, and some of them died without getting justice,” he said.
“We have to hold the Chinese government accountable for what they did over 30 years ago; we should not let them get away with it.”
A spokesperson for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said in a statement that the Australian government had “deep concerns about the erosion of rights and freedoms in Hong Kong, including the actions of Hong Kong authorities in targeting pro-democracy activists” and “continues to raise human rights concerns directly with the Hong Kong and Chinese governments regularly and at the highest levels”.
Chow’s closing submission
Chow said in her closing submission, which has been obtained by the ABC, that in this case, the standards of right and wrong had been completely reversed.
“Telling the truth is recast as inciting hatred, seeking justice as exploiting suffering, limiting power as violating the Constitution, and returning power to the people as subverting the state,” she said.
“We seek to end one-party dictatorship, bring about a democratic transition, and effect a change of regime.
“No matter how the prosecution tries to portray this as criminal with its discourses, our position remains unchanged, as does our judgement of right and wrong.”
Chow said what was truly on trial was Hong Kong law.
“The court’s verdict will declare to the whole world whether our law can still uphold the bottom line of the rule of law and democracy, or if it has already stooped to becoming a watchdog for dictatorship,” she said.
The judgement is expected to be delivered in July.
The Hong Kong government was asked for comment.