After crackdown on Hong Kong, overseas communities carry the torch to keep Tiananmen memories alive

By KANIS LEUNG and TIAN MACLEOD JI
Associated Press

HONG KONG (AP) — China has quashed large-scale commemorations of Tuesday’s 35th anniversary of Beijing’s Tiananmen Square crackdown within its borders. But outside the country, commemorative events have grown increasingly crucial for preserving memories of the 1989 bloodletting, in which government troops opened fire on pro-democracy protesters resulting in hundreds, if not thousands, dead. Over the past few years, talks, rallies, exhibitions and plays have emerged in the U.S., Britain, Canada, Australia and Taiwan. These activities foster hope and counteract efforts to erase reminders of one of the darkest chapters in modern China’s history. Hong Kong’s decades-old annual vigil that mourned those who died has vanished after enactment of a China-imposed security law.