In 1993, when the First Symposium on Journalism in Mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong was held here, press freedom was considered so sensitive a topic it was not even on the agenda.
The impetus for holding such a historic conference to allow senior news executives from the mainland and Taiwan to meet for the first time since 1949 came from veteran journalists on both sides of the strait.
As the intermediary whose job was to make it all happen, the Hong Kong News Executives' Association was concerned that formal discussion of press freedom, over which deep ideological differences remained, might add to the political hurdles it had to overcome in hosting the conference.
But, while press freedom was not a formal topic for discussion, this did not stop the delegates from airing their disagreement on the meaning of a free press as they talked about such seemingly uncontroversial topics as development of the press in all three places.
Since then, the mainland and Taiwan have taken turns to organise the second and third symposiums, held respectively aboard a cruise ship on the Yangtze River and in Taipei (Macau joined the symposium from last year.) Over time, exchanges between the delegates, both at and away from the conference venues, have cemented ties between the four societies.
At the just-concluded fourth symposium, held at the Miramar Hotel in Tsim Sha Tsui this week, a breakthrough finally occurred.
