Hong Kong: Organisers of Tiananmen Massacre vigil may be ousted from Companies Registry
Hong Kong, September 13 (ANI): Hong Kong government has continued their crackdown against organisers of the annual Tiananmen Massacre vigil. In the latest move, the authorities have indicated that the organisers may soon be ousted from the Companies Registry.
The government notice came as leaders of the 32-year-old group were remanded in custody over national security law charges, reported Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP).
In a letter to the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China vice-chair Chow Hang-tung on Friday, Secretary for Security Chris Tang said he would ask the Chief Executive in Council to exercise their power to strike off the group in accordance with the Companies (Winding-Up and Miscellaneous Provisions) Ordinance.
The city's leader Carrie Lam and her advisory panel are empowered to order the Registrar of Companies to remove entities from the registry. They may exercise such powers if they are satisfied that the company is liable to have its operation prohibited by the security minister.
It also applies to firms that are likely to have their registration under the Societies Ordinance cancelled.
Tang, who used to lead the city's police force, said he received an initial recommendation for making such a move from the new police chief Raymond Siu.
"[I]f the 'Hong Kong Alliance' were a society in respect of which the Societies Ordinance applied, it would be necessary in the interests of national security, public safety and public order to prohibit its operation or continued operation under section 8 of that Ordinance," Tang wrote, referring to the Societies Ordinance.
Tang's warning marked the latest move in the crackdown on the organisation founded in 1989.
The embattled alliance, together with its chairman Lee Cheuk-yan and vice-chiefs Albert Ho and Chow, were charged with "incitement to subversion" on Friday.
Hong Kong national security police on Thursday raided the Tiananmen Massacre Museum, as a part of a major crackdown against dissent and pro-democracy civil society groups.
The July 4th Museum, commemorating the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, was closed down in early June, just three days after it was reopened with a new exhibition.
Organizers then had said that the museum was shut down "to ensure the safety of staff and visitors," the Hong Kong Free Press reported.
On Wednesday, police arrested the Alliance's leaders after they refused to hand over information as part of a national security probe.
According to Hong Kong Free Press, the arrests came the morning after they publicly refused a police demand for information as part of a national security probe into the 32-year-old group.
Pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong used to organize an annual vigil to commemorate victims of student protests that broke out in Beijing on April 15, 1989, and culminated on June 4 of that year in violent clashes which claimed over 200 lives.
In June 2020, the police banned the vigil for the first time in thirty years in view of protests in Hong Kong over Beijing's plans to adopt new security legislation, while officially citing the need to comply with coronavirus-related restrictions.
China, with the help of local authorities, has been ruling Hong Kong with an iron fist. Authorities have also begun clamping down on pro-democracy activists. As China has strengthened control over Hong Kong through varieties of laws including the draconian National Security Law, the people of the semi-autonomous city are facing increasing policing and crackdown. (ANI)
