MAY 8, 2015 8:56 AM May 8, 2015 8:56 am
People’s Liberation Army personnel had been invited to other institutions of higher learning in the past, as in this visit to the University of Hong Kong in 2010.
The Chinese University of Hong Kong has postponed a campus visit of soldiers from the People’s Liberation Army, after students protested against the invitation to what they called troops of a “totalitarian regime.”
“On June 4, 1989, the People’s Liberation Army bloodily cracked down on the students’ democratic movement, massacring the people with tanks and live ammunition,” the university’s student union said in a statement on Wednesday, referring to the military suppression of student-led demonstrations around Tiananmen Square that left hundreds, perhaps thousands, dead. “To let an army serving a totalitarian regime enter our campus is to set a precedent of working with the People’s Liberation Army.”
Later that day, the university announced that the visit by soldiers from the Hong Kong garrison of the P.L.A., which was to have taken place on Friday and which included a seminar, a basketball game with students and a luncheon with university leaders, would not take place as scheduled.
“Due to a misunderstanding of the intent of the event by some parties, the university and the People’s Liberation Army Hong Kong garrison have decided to postpone the visit,” the university’s Office of Student Affairs wrote in an email to students. The university did not provide a new date for the visit.
Chinese University was the site of a rally in September protesting Beijing’s decision on the framework for selecting Hong Kong’s next leader, the chief executive, in 2017. Under those rules, all eligible voters would be allowed to cast ballots, but only for two or three candidates vetted by a committee critics said would yield to Beijing’s wishes. The rally preceded a weeklong student strike, which expanded to protests outside the Hong Kong government headquarters and nearly three months of street protests calling for greater public participation in choosing the candidates for chief executive.
