BEIJING — In Tiananmen Square, police were ready to pounce at the first sign of protest. In Hong Kong, a sea of candles flickered in the hands of tens of thousands who vented their grief and anger.
Two contrasting faces of China were on display Thursday, the 20th anniversary of the military’s bloody crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators — from Beijing’s rigid control in suppressing any dissent, to freewheeling Hong Kong, which enjoys freedoms all but absent on the mainland.
Tiananmen Square was blanketed by security officers who were ready to silence any potential demonstration, and there were few hints that the vast plaza was the epicenter of a student-led movement that was crushed on June 3-4, 1989.
But in Hong Kong’s Victoria Park, a crowd chanted slogans calling for Beijing to own up to the crackdown and release political dissidents. Organizers estimated its size at 150,000, while police put the number at 62,800.
Hong Kong is one of the few places in China where the events of June 1989 are not off-limits, because the territory operates under a separate political system.
by the associated press
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