Simpsons episode showing Tiananmen Square missing from Disney+ in Hong Kong

Disney has been accused of capitulating to Chinese censorship after it omitted an episode of The Simpsons which references the Tiananmen Square massacre from its streaming service in Hong Kong.

The entertainment giant launched its Disney+ streaming service in the city earlier this month, offering customers 32 seasons of The Simpsons.

But eagle-eyed fans have noticed that an episode in which the American family visits Tiananmen Square in Beijing is missing from the service.

The episode, “Goo Goo Gai Pan” first aired in 2005, satirises the Chinese state's heavy censorship of discussion around the deadly massacre, during which more than 1,000 protesters were estimated to have been killed.

In one scene, the Simpson family visits the site of the massacre where they encounter a plaque that reads: “On this site, in 1989, nothing happened.”

In the episode Homer Simpson calls Mao Zedong a "little angel" who killed millions.

It stars Lucy Liu, whose parents were Chinese, and also includes a scene referencing the famous “Tank Man” photo, in which one man stands defiantly before a column of tanks after the military moved in to crush student-led protests on June 4, 1989.

As of Monday, episodes 11 and 13 of season 16 were available in Hong Kong but episode 12 - “Goo Goo Gai Pan” - was not.

It is not clear whether Disney preemptively removed the episode when it launched Disney+ in Hong Kong, or whether it dropped it following pressure from officials.

The company has not yet responded to a request for comment.

The omission of the episode fuels concerns about censorship in Hong Kong, where draconian laws have attempted to silence dissent and pro-democracy protests in the city.

It has also raised questions over how willing American companies are to self-censor their content in order to protect their interests in China's lucrative market.

“Whether it’s self-censorship or whether it’s direct censorship, it is based on the calculation of how significant the China market is to Disney, or any other American company,” Steve Tsang, director of the SOAS China Institute in London, told the Wall Street Journal.

“It is about the China market. And the clear understanding that the Chinese government will not hesitate to use its economic muscle based on the size of its market to get its way.”

It is not the first time Disney has courted controversy over its dealings with the Chinese government.

Last year Disney faced calls to boycott its remake of the film "Mulan" after it emerged that some scenes were filmed in the western Chinese region of Xinjiang, the site of widely documented human rights abuses against the Uighur and other Muslim minorities.

The film's credits also thanked Chinese government entities which had been sanctioned by the US for human rights abuses.

Disney defended the decision to film parts of "Mulan" in Xinjiang in the interest of "authenticity".

The company added: “Chinese regulations prohibit foreign producers from operating independently and require them to partner with a Chinese production company”.

Until recently, semi-autonomous Hong Kong boasted significant artistic and political freedoms compared with mainland China.

But Beijing has steadily tightened its grip on the city in the wake of huge and often violent democracy protests two years ago.

A recently passed censorship law bans films deemed a threat to national security, with penalties as high as three years in prison.

Disney's decision not to air The Simpsons' Tiananmen Square episode is thought to be the first notable instance of an American streaming giant censoring content in Hong Kong.

While China has largely erased references to the massacre from books and the internet on the mainland, it has long been openly commemorated in Hong Kong.

In the last 18 months Hong Kong officials have banned an annual candlelight vigil for the massacre, citing the pandemic.

Meanwhile, security officials in one of China's largest provinces have commissioned a surveillance system to track journalists and international students, according to documents seen by Reuters.

Henan's provincial government plans to use 3,000 facial recognition cameras to compile files on people of interest, according to the report.

US-based surveillance research firm IPVM, which has closely tracked surveillance networks and first identified the Henan document, said the plan was unique in specifying journalists as surveillance targets and providing a blueprint for public security authorities to quickly locate them and obstruct their work.