No amount of smarmy rationalization and rabble-rousing alters the fact that the death penalty is a vicious affront to a civilized society. But capital punishment is not the preserve of autocratic governments. Perfectly democratic processes in countries around the world have instituted capital punishment and many of these states show no signs of removing it from their books. So opponents of the death penalty should not be too hard on Taiwan in this respect.
Yet the executions of two brothers in Kaohsiung this week, together with the complicity of most of the media in refusing to report on the matter in meaningful detail, suggest that there remains an obliviousness to the killing of prisoners in a society in which courts are laughably inconsistent and the law is sneered at by the opposition party that wrote most of it in the first place.
Most of all, however, the deaths of Lin Meng-kai (
In 1996, when Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (
Good gracious, many marveled at the time, behold this politician's conscience! Despite his adherence to a suicidal "Greater China" ideology and the dubious ethics of his associates, Ma attracts traditional DPP voters on the basis of his sincere image and ability to occasionally stand up and be counted at the most surprising of times. And that was one of those times.
Ten years later, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is in power, but the power of the conscience has apparently evaporated and death remains an attractive option for the nation's prosecutors. Imagine the surreal scene when Chen met international human-rights activists in the Presidential Office in September. He had to account for the retention of a weapon of state whose traditional victims were political, and in countless instances innocent of the crimes with which they were charged. One can imagine Chen barely keeping a straight face as he told International Federation for Human Rights delegates that he was working to end the death penalty. Which begs the question: What work, exactly?
Perhaps Chen was too busy licking his wounds from the DPP's loss of long-held county electorates earlier this month to notice this week's killings. Perhaps being president is such an onerous task that one forgets the years spent as a lawyer working on behalf of democracy activists threatened with death -- including Vice President Annette Lu (
If a president with Chen's background lacks the conscience to intervene on a matter such as this, and lacks the courage and ambition to face the public and explain why he has intervened, yet has all of the constitutional power and time he needs to do both of these things, then what is he doing in the Presidential Office?
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and
As former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) wrapped up his visit to the People’s Republic of China, he received his share of attention. Certainly, the trip must be seen within the full context of Ma’s life, that is, his eight-year presidency, the Sunflower movement and his failed Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement, as well as his eight years as Taipei mayor with its posturing, accusations of money laundering, and ups and downs. Through all that, basic questions stand out: “What drives Ma? What is his end game?” Having observed and commented on Ma for decades, it is all ironically reminiscent of former US president Harry