PRO-DEMOCRACY activist and legislator Szeto Wah yesterday termed

Premier Zhu Rongji's dismissal of the 10th anniversary of the

Tiananmen crackdown as "hypocritical".

"Even the spokesman of the Chinese Foreign Ministry had frequently

talked about it lately.

"He dismissed the question very diplomatically and avoided the

question. But isn't that an overtly and hypocritical way of dismissing

the question?" asked Mr Szeto, who is chairman of the Hong Kong

Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China.

The alliance, which is branded a subversive group by Beijing, has been

organising annual marches and candlelight vigils at Victoria Park to

commemorate the crackdown.

Mr Zhu said on Friday, when asked what the government could do to

compensate the families of those killed in the 1989 pro-democracy

protests, that he had "almost forgotten" the occasion.

Friday night's candlelight vigil at Victoria Park drew more than

70,000 people _ the biggest turnout since 1992, when 80,000 people

attended.

Mr Szeto dismissed a report by the pro-Beijing Wen Wei Po yesterday

that only 27,000 people attended.

Police estimates of the number of people who attended the annual

vigils in the past 10 years had differed from the alliance's estimates

by at least 100 per cent every year, he said.

But the police declined to give an estimate of the number of

participants.

The alliance collected about $1.2 million in donations on Friday night

_ one of the highest amounts collected in many years, according to Mr

Szeto.

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