May 21st, 1989, the "Global Chinese People's March", organized by the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China (the Alliance), was begun in Hong Kong. At the end of May, lead Alliance representative Lee Cheuk-yan and members of the Hong Kong Federation of Students went to Beijing to support the student movement. The evening of June 5th, after the gunfire of June 4th, Lee and the majority of Hong Kong journalists and students boarded a charter Dragonair flight sent by the Hong Kong government. Before the flight took off, though, a dozen or so Public Security personnel forced their way onto the plane and took Lee away. The Beijing government declared him to have had contacts with "illegal organizations" in Tian'anmen Square, and required him to comply with a Public Security department investigation.

Lee's arrest in Beijing as a representative of the Hong Kong people inspired protests in Hong Kong. Late on the night of June 5th, nearly ten thousand people gathered outside Xinhua News Agency's Hong Kong bureau and sat in meditation, demanding that Agency head Xu Jiatun personally meet with Lee. The then-Governor of Hong Kong sent an urgent telegram to then-UK Prime Minister Thatcher for aid. After three days under house arrest, at the demand of the Beijing government, Lee Cheuk-yan wrote a "Letter of Repentance", admitting that "contacts with and rendering economic aid to counterrevolutionary, rebellious, illegal organizations during the period of martial law is wrong behavior". All HK$1.9 million that he brought to Beijing, which had been donated by the people of Hong Kong, was confiscated by Public Security. June 8th, he was permitted to board a plane back to Hong Kong.

Alliance representative Lee Cheuk-yan was not the only person held in short-term custody and forced to write a letter of repentance in Beijing before being allowed to return to Hong Kong; Hong Kong Economic Times reporter Law Yee-Ping and others were subjected to the same treatment.