The students staging sit-ins around the nation in protest at what they call the use of excessive force by police to disperse demonstrators during the recent visit by a Chinese envoy are planning to build an art installation at the Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall in Taipei to symbolize their opposition to authoritarianism.
Lee Li-wei (李立偉), spokesman of the Wild Strawberry Student Movement staging the sit-in at the hall’s Liberty Square, told the Taipei Times yesterday that the student demonstrators were planning to build a “strawberry tower,” a bamboo art piece 6m to 7m in height, at the square.
“We hope to highlight our efforts to breach an authoritarian space and our refusal to conform” to authoritarian rule, he said.
PHOTO: CNA
The students began their sit-in in front of the Executive Yuan on Nov. 6. They reconvened their sit-in at Liberty Square after being evicted from the Executive Yuan by the police because they had not applied for a demonstration permit.
The students have called for the immediate amendment of the Assembly and Parade Law (集會遊行法) to rescind the requirement for event organizers to seek approval from law enforcement authorities before holding a rally. In addition, the students are demanding a public apology from President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) over the police’s handling of protests, as well as the replacement of National Security Bureau Director-General Tsai Chao-ming (蔡朝明) and National Police Agency Director-General Wang Cho-chun (王卓鈞).
A number of student groups have launched sit-ins nationwide in support of the students in Taipei.
Lee said the number of students participating in the Liberty Square sit-in had dropped sharply to a maximum of 40 to 50 students per day.
More than 500 students from around the nation protested at Liberty Square on Saturday.
Lee did not specify the reasons for the dwindling numbers, but an article posted on the students’ Web blog, action1106.blogspot.com, said that “everyone was tired” and that “some of the student leaders influenced participants’ spirits by bringing in their personal emotions” to the sit-in.
Lee said the protesters who remained at the square would not give up.
They hope to raise other people’s awareness of the movement’s agenda by distributing flyers on the street or holding conferences in colleges around the nation, Lee said.
AGING: While Japan has 22 submarines, Taiwan only operates four, two of which were commissioned by the US in 1945 and 1946, and transferred to Taiwan in 1973 Taiwan would need at least 12 submarines to reach modern fleet capabilities, CSBC Corp, Taiwan chairman Chen Cheng-hung (陳政宏) said in an interview broadcast on Friday, citing a US assessment. CSBC is testing the nation’s first indigenous defense submarine, the Hai Kun (海鯤, Narwhal), which is scheduled to be delivered to the navy next month or in July. The Hai Kun has completed torpedo-firing tests and is scheduled to undergo overnight sea trials, Chen said on an SET TV military affairs program. Taiwan would require at least 12 submarines to establish a modern submarine force after assessing the nation’s operational environment and defense
A white king snake that frightened passengers and caused a stir on a Taipei MRT train on Friday evening has been claimed by its owner, who would be fined, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. A person on Threads posted that he thought he was lucky to find an empty row of seats on Friday after boarding a train on the Bannan (Blue) Line, only to spot a white snake with black stripes after sitting down. Startled, he jumped up, he wrote, describing the encounter as “terrifying.” “Taipei’s rat control plan: Release snakes on the metro,” one person wrote in reply, referring
The coast guard today said that it had disrupted "illegal" operations by a Chinese research ship in waters close to the nation and driven it away, part of what Taipei sees a provocative pattern of China's stepped up maritime activities. The coast guard said that it on Thursday last week detected the Chinese ship Tongji (同濟號), which was commissioned only last year, 29 nautical miles (54km) southeast of the southern tip of Taiwan, although just outside restricted waters. The ship was observed lowering ropes into the water, suspected to be the deployment of scientific instruments for "illegal" survey operations, and the coast
Taiwan’s two cases of hantavirus so far this year are on par with previous years’ case numbers, and the government is coordinating rat extermination work, so there should not be any outbreaks, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) said today in an interview with the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper). An increase in rat sightings in Taipei and New Taipei City has raised concerns about the spread of hantavirus, as rats can carry the disease. In January, a man in his 70s who lived in Taipei’s Daan District (大安) tested positive posthumously for hantavirus, Taiwan’s
RSS