China abruptly pulled off the air Taiwan’s Golden Melody Awards, sometimes referred to as the “Asian Grammys,” on Saturday after a presenter expressed his support for the ongoing pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong.

The awards ceremony, live-streamed across the Asian continent, was immediately taken off air after presenter Jen Chiang-da said: “Hong Kong, add oil.” As noted by the BBC, the phrase “add oil” was added the Oxford English Dictionary last year as a translation “Jia you,” used to express encouragement or support.

Jen Chiang-da, who founded the independent label Crystal Records, went on to lambast China for the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989 as he presented a “special contribution” to Blacklist Studio, a group of Taiwanese musicians who released their own pro-democracy-themed album entitled Songs of Madness in 1989.

“In 1989, the Berlin Wall collapsed, the June 4 Tiananmen Square incident took place, Cheng Nan-jung sacrificed himself for democracy, and the Blacklist Studio released the Songs of Madness,” he said. “It was the year when the world was making an effort to move towards a new order of having more freedom and democracy.”

“However, the authority of this land was still the same, and the authorities abused power,” he continued. “The Songs of Madness subverted the conservative history of the Government’s decree on the music industry, and opened a new era of independence and autonomy for our pop music.”

Shortly after Jen made his remarks, China’s notorious censors cut the show off. Beijing’s government censors work round the clock to prohibit the dissemination of anything critical of China’s one-party communist dictatorship.

Last October, media censors also cut off coverage of The Golden Horse Awards, otherwise known as the “Chinese Oscars,” after documentary filmmaker Fu Yue used her acceptance speech to express her support for Taiwan’s full independence, denouncing the Chinese Communist Party’s “One China Policy,” which aims to reunify Taiwan with China.

People in Taiwan have been paying close attention to pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong, which began in response to the latest extradition bill proposed by Hong Kong’s pro-Beijing government, but also form part of a wider attempt to push back against China’s malign influence on the city’s laws and culture.

The demonstrations spilled over into serious violence on Monday as protesters clashed with police and stormed the city’s legislature to mark the 22nd anniversary of the transfer of sovereignty over Hong Kong from the old British Empire to the Chinese Communist Party.

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