Overnight, “Pillar of Shame” statue was withdrawn from Hong Kong

On Thursday, Hong Kong’s oldest university demolished a memorial to those killed in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. The operation to demolish the statue lasted all night. This 8-meter-high statue has been on the university campus since 1997.

A Danish artist, Jens Galschiot, made it as a memorial to the victims of China’s Tiananmen Square incident in June 1989.

In this eight-meter-high pillar, called the "Pillar of Shame”, mutilated bodies of 50 people were displayed lying on top of each other.

While deconstructing it, Hong Kong University personnel placed high-rise barriers so that no one could see what was going on behind that curtain. Then, over the course of the next few hours, they demolished the “Pillar of Shame,” which had been there for decades.

The approximately eight-meter-high craft was built in 1989 to honor the victims of China’s use of force against pro-democracy protestors in Tiananmen Square, Beijing. The removal of this craft is thought to be part of the Chinese Communist Party’s effort to wipe memories of the Tiananmen Square bloodshed from the public’s minds.