Hong Kong’s June 4 museum closes – but organisers vow to reopen
Group running the site decided to leave their premises after a legal battle that they believed was politically motivated
Visitors on Monday flocked to the world’s only museum dedicated to the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown on its last day as organisers vowed to reopen it within a year.
The Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China has decided to close down the June 4 memorial located in Foo Hoo Centre – a Tsim Sha Tsui tower block – after the building’s owners’ corporation staged a legal battle and adopted measures hindering its operation that the alliance believed were “politically motivated”.
“Although the closure of this museum at this particular venue is permanent, I can assure you a new museum will soon be reopened, hopefully within one year,” Albert Ho Chun-yan, chairman of the alliance, said.
Set up in 2014, the June 4 Museum was soon locked in a protracted legal battle with the owners’ corporation, which argued the floors could not be used for exhibition purposes, in line with the building’s deeds.
The alliance said it was odd for the corporation’s chairman, Stanly Chau Kwok-chiu, to pour his own – and “unlimited” – financial resources into the litigation, and a member of the corporation once admitted political considerations were behind their objections.
