A FORMER house of torture and execution was declared a historic monument yesterday.
The Central Police Station's grisly past was overlooked after a ruling that the buildings could not be defaced, altered or demolished without a government permit was gazetted under the Antiquities and Monuments Ordinance.
The buildings have been called 'an oasis of peace' and 'a time capsule' in the heart of Central District.
But Keith Francis, a member of the Police Museum Advisory Committee, recalled how an old man returned from Canada to Hong Kong 'to go back to the room where he had been tortured by the Japanese'.
Work started in 1841 on the compound, which once housed a gibbet for hanging criminals. During the war, it was used by Japanese forces as an interrogation centre.
As well as the police station, it included Victoria Prison and the former Central Magistracy. The three buildings together represented the former centre of administration, justice and law in Hong Kong.
