Hongkongers can mark Tiananmen Square crackdown in private without breaching Article 23 national security law, government advisers say
- Executive Council convenor Regina Ip says she sees no problem with private acts of commemoration
- Barrister Ronny Tong, an Exco member, agrees, but says any public commemorations not likely in ‘foreseeable future’
But one of them said on Sunday that any public commemorations of the 1989 incident in the near future were unlikely.
Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, convenor of the government’s key decision-making Executive Council, said she did not see a problem if individuals commemorated events away from the public eye.
“Both the offences of ‘incitement to disaffection’ and ‘acts with seditious intention’ involve stirring up hatred against the establishment,” Ip added.
“If a person commemorates any dates in private, without the intention of stirring up hatred against the country or institutions established in Hong Kong, I don’t think the person commits an offence.”
She was speaking just days before the June 4 anniversary, the first since the city’s domestic national security legislation was passed in March.
