China accused the United States on Thursday of distorting facts and smearing its political system, after Secretary of State Marco Rubio said censorship could not “erase” the memory of Beijing’s 1989 Tiananmen crackdown.

On June 4 that year, the Chinese government sent troops and tanks to crush protests calling for political reform in and around Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.

The death toll remains unknown, and discussion of what happened is censored in mainland China.

Rubio told a news conference on Wednesday that “no amount of censorship can erase the past”.

“Those who sacrificed to uphold their unalienable rights of free expression and peaceful assembly will be vindicated someday,” he said.

China’s foreign ministry said Thursday it firmly opposed Rubio’s comments.

“The Chinese government has long since reached a clear conclusion regarding that political turmoil that occurred in the late 1980s,” ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning told a regular news briefing.

“The relevant erroneous remarks by the US side distort historical facts, smear China’s political system and development path, and interfere in China’s internal affairs,” she said.

This year, authorities reportedly prevented the families of those who died in 1989 from visiting their graves at Beijing’s Wan’an Cemetery, with Amnesty International calling the move “a heartless act”.

Beijing has also moved in recent years to snuff out all public commemorations in Hong Kong, where an annual candlelight vigil had been held for decades before the imposition of a national security law in 2020.

AFP reporters saw a heavy police presence on Wednesday near Hong Kong’s Victoria Park, the former site of the event.

Late that night, activist Tang Ngok-kwan stood alone in the park, reading the names of hundreds of victims in a low voice under the watchful eyes of several plainclothes police officers.

Derek Chu, a former district councillor who has been giving out free candles in his shop every anniversary since 2022, told AFP that “the space for (free) speech is more and more narrow”.