TIANANMEN Square, focal point of the 1989 protests, was virtually deserted yesterday.
The vast esplanade, which easily accommodated one million Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution, contained no more than 2,000 people at midday, nearly all of them tourists from the provinces and plain-clothes security agents.
The heightened security presence in the square was evident, with the Monument to the People's Heroes, where student protesters made their headquarters in 1989, being particularly tightly guarded.
''We have no special feelings,'' said a woman tourist from eastern Qingdao as she walked through the square. ''China has seen big changes in the past four years.'' The steps at the base of the monument were roped off by a heavy metal chain and about a dozen uniformed police officers were stationed under multi-coloured parasols on the first two levels leading up to the obelisk.
Several plain-clothes agents with ill-concealed video cameras and walkie-talkies were positioned just to the north of the monument, providing additional back-up.
In the event, their services were not required. Beijing residents knew all too well there was no point trying to publicly commemorate the anniversary of the massacre.
''You would have to be crazy to do something like that,'' said the brother of a young factory worker who died as the military broke through the barricades at Xidan, about 11/2 kilometres to the west of Tiananmen Square.
