Today, on International Human Rights Day, groups will hold vigils and celebrations around the globe to mark 60 years since the UN adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).
It is a day to pause and appreciate the freedoms we have, note the progress we have made since the Martial Law-era and remember those who live or lived under oppression.
In Hong Kong on Sunday, members of Independent PEN took to the streets early, calling for the principles of the UDHR to be respected and for China to release around 50 writers known to be imprisoned because of the words they dared to air.
That is a call protesters could hardly have made in communist China without risking detention themselves. Six decades after the UDHR’s inception, the principles enshrined in it — as well as in the UN human rights conventions that Beijing has since signed — carry little or no weight with Chinese authorities.
Last week, reports emerged that China had launched another of its infamous “strike hard” campaigns, this time to renew its stranglehold on a media environment that it thinks is getting out of hand. While the campaign will apparently target the domestic media to ensure that reports do not fuel the country’s swelling social unrest, the foreign press can hardly hope for better treatment.
News of the campaign followed on the heels of two reports at the end of last month that Chinese authorities violated the lofty freedoms they promised foreign journalists during the Summer Olympics — a set of relaxed guidelines that Beijing reaffirmed after the Games ended.
On Nov. 28, a British correspondent for the Christian Science Monitor was detained while covering a story about one of China’s countless underground churches — considered a scourge by Beijing despite its repeated assertions that it respects freedom of religion. Peter Ford was taken to an airport in Henan Province and sent back to Beijing immediately after being questioned for three hours, Reporters without Borders said.
Even more disturbing were reports that a Belgian TV crew were assaulted a day earlier for covering treatment of AIDS patients — also in Henan Province. The crew said they were pulled from their car, their videotapes and reporters’ notes taken and that they were beaten up.
The attack would hardly be the first on a journalist in China, where at least 10 foreign reporters were roughed up during the Olympics. It is not known how many domestic media workers might regularly meet such harassment. But the news was particularly symbolic of Beijing’s well-documented hypocrisy on matters of human rights, as it came just three days before World AIDS Day. To mark that day, Dec. 1, China held events designed to remake its notorious image as a regime that discriminates against AIDS patients and brutally represses open dialogue on the spread of the disease within its borders.
Every human being is entitled to the rights set forth in the UDHR. Unfortunately, the world remains a place where those rights must be fought for. As Taiwan again finds itself in a disquieting position in which the government must be reminded of its duties to respect rights that the nation had only recently begun to take for granted, we would do well to reflect on the harsh reality in neighboring countries and refocus our eyes on the goal.
In the event of a war with China, Taiwan has some surprisingly tough defenses that could make it as difficult to tackle as a porcupine: A shoreline dotted with swamps, rocks and concrete barriers; conscription for all adult men; highways and airports that are built to double as hardened combat facilities. This porcupine has a soft underbelly, though, and the war in Iran is exposing it: energy. About 39,000 ships dock at Taiwan’s ports each year, more than the 30,000 that transit the Strait of Hormuz. About one-fifth of their inbound tonnage is coal, oil, refined fuels and liquefied natural gas (LNG),
On Monday, the day before Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) departed on her visit to China, the party released a promotional video titled “Only with peace can we ‘lie flat’” to highlight its desire to have peace across the Taiwan Strait. However, its use of the expression “lie flat” (tang ping, 躺平) drew sarcastic comments, with critics saying it sounded as if the party was “bowing down” to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Amid the controversy over the opposition parties blocking proposed defense budgets, Cheng departed for China after receiving an invitation from the CCP, with a meeting with
To counter the CCP’s escalating threats, Taiwan must build a national consensus and demonstrate the capability and the will to fight. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) often leans on a seductive mantra to soften its threats, such as “Chinese do not kill Chinese.” The slogan is designed to frame territorial conquest (annexation) as a domestic family matter. A look at the historical ledger reveals a different truth. For the CCP, being labeled “family” has never been a guarantee of safety; it has been the primary prerequisite for state-sanctioned slaughter. From the forced starvation of 150,000 civilians at the Siege of Changchun
The two major opposition parties, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), jointly announced on Tuesday last week that former TPP lawmaker Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) would be their joint candidate for Chiayi mayor, following polling conducted earlier this month. It is the first case of blue-white (KMT-TPP) cooperation in selecting a joint candidate under an agreement signed by their chairpersons last month. KMT and TPP supporters have blamed their 2024 presidential election loss on failing to decide on a joint candidate, which ended in a dramatic breakdown with participants pointing fingers, calling polls unfair, sobbing and walking
RSS