Yahoo TV

STORY: EDITORS PLEASE NOTE: RESENDING THIS STORY TO CLARIFY PROTESTERS, INCLUDING ALEXANDRA WONG, WERE GENERALLY DETAINED, WITH ONLY FOUR ARRESTED BY HONG KONG POLICE.

A pro-democracy activist was among scores detained by Hong Kong police along with at least four people arrested as authorities tightened security on the 34th anniversary of China's bloody crackdown on protesters in Tiananmen Square.

Restrictions in Hong Kong have stifled what were once the biggest vigils and memorials marking the 1989 student demonstrations, leaving cities outside Chinese control to keep alive the memory on the June 4 anniversary.

Among those detained on Sunday were Alexandra Wong, a prominent democracy activist known as “Grandma Wong.” Another person detained was carrying the script of theatrical play, “May 35th.”

The play has not been performed in Hong Kong since the year 2020, before the enactment of a national security law that Beijing imposed on the city later that year.

The play tells the story of a husband and wife dealing with the loss of their son who was killed when troops opened fire on democracy protesters in and around Tiananmen Square 34 years ago.

This performance was staged in Taipei, Taiwan, last week, a democratic self-governing island that Beijing claims is part of China.

On Sunday, Taiwanese residents held a vigil of the sort now impossible in Hong Kong.

One attendee here told Reuters the crackdown in Hong Kong hurt her. She said she felt very sad for Hong Kong, and did not believe it was going to return to the past era of political freedom.

Others said Taiwanese needed to stand up for freedom, a value they cherished.

Beijing has staged military drills around the island, and harshly criticized the American government's ties to Taiwan.

In a sign of ongoing tensions in the region: a Chinese warship came within 150 yards of a U.S. destroyer in the Taiwan Strait, in what American officials described as "an unsafe manner."

It came as U.S. and Canadian navies were conducting a joint exercise in the strait, which separates the island of Taiwan from mainland China.

China blamed the United States for "deliberately provoking risk" in the region.