Egypt is the first Arab Spring country that has brought its former ruler to justice, imprisoning former president Hosni Mubarak for life for the killing of protesters last year. Neither Mubarak nor the crowds listening to the sentencing were happy with the verdict: The former was displeased over the severity of the sentence and the latter thought he got off too lightly. Even if you could say this is delayed justice, it is justice nevertheless. This, at least, has been welcomed by many people in the country.
It has been 23 years since the Tiananmen Square Massacre of June 4, 1989, but it is still very much a contentious issue. Every year, on the anniversary of the event, the Chinese government gets jittery. What is Beijing going to do about a problem like June 4?
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶) has the will to address the situation and resistance to revisiting the incident has waned following the Bo Xilai (薄熙來) controversy. However, while many of the main players in the massacre, such as then-Chinese premier Li Peng (李鵬), are still alive, it will be very difficult for China to view the matter with any objectivity.
During those 23 years, China has come a long way and it now has a stronger economy and a more well-equipped military. However, China is still not regarded internationally as a mainstream advanced country, as it lags far behind global standards in terms of politics and human rights. The Tiananmen Massacre is an important benchmark for the development of human rights in China. Until the events of that fateful day are addressed, and while the government restricts the Internet and suppresses its people on the eve of the anniversary of the event, China will always be a backward country.
Taiwan experienced something similar. During the 1980s, the economy was soaring and political reform was under way, but this was all under the shadow of the 228 Massacre and the period of White Terror. Social divisions only started to heal after then-president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) ordered an investigation into the suppression of political dissidents, offered an apology and legislated compensation for the victims. Nevertheless, the authorities have not managed to put the 228 Massacre completely behind us, as the investigation was not complete and a consensus on what exactly happened has yet to be reached.
It was thus possible for former premier Hau Pei-tsun (郝柏村) to express doubts over the actual number of people who died and for some academics to produce historical documents purporting to show the government had actually compensated the victims soon after the incident. These people reject the documented historical situation and are using non-impartial evidence to support their biased ideas.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) itself has been responsible for reinterpreting its past, to which China’s implementation of market reforms, the Cultural Revolution and the role of the Gang of Four can attest. Surely the reinterpretation of angry protests in Guangdong Province’s Wukan village is yet another example, with the reported “imported mob” later revealed to have been a group of enraged villagers.
As power is transferred to a new generation of leaders, the political situation and the resolve of Beijing’s leaders will be crucial for political reform.
The Tiananmen Massacre remains taboo in China. However, economic and military success in the intervening years mean that China is standing on the verge of social and political reform, which could spell the beginning of the thaw. The first step to this end must be an investigation into the truth. This is the joint responsibility of officials and the public alike and such an investigation must be unbiased and objective if it is to have any hope of laying the foundations for understanding and forgiveness between the victims and the protagonists. If this does not happen, the enmity and fear will become protracted and China will sink into a state of internal conflict from which it will be difficult to return.
Before 1945, the most widely spoken language in Taiwan was Tai-gi (also known as Taiwanese, Taiwanese Hokkien or Hoklo). However, due to almost a century of language repression policies, many Taiwanese believe that Tai-gi is at risk of disappearing. To understand this crisis, I interviewed academics and activists about Taiwan’s history of language repression, the major challenges of revitalizing Tai-gi and their policy recommendations. Although Taiwanese were pressured to speak Japanese when Taiwan became a Japanese colony in 1895, most managed to keep their heritage languages alive in their homes. However, starting in 1949, when the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) enacted martial law
“Si ambulat loquitur tetrissitatque sicut anas, anas est” is, in customary international law, the three-part test of anatine ambulation, articulation and tetrissitation. And it is essential to Taiwan’s existence. Apocryphally, it can be traced as far back as Suetonius (蘇埃托尼烏斯) in late first-century Rome. Alas, Suetonius was only talking about ducks (anas). But this self-evident principle was codified as a four-part test at the Montevideo Convention in 1934, to which the United States is a party. Article One: “The state as a person of international law should possess the following qualifications: a) a permanent population; b) a defined territory; c) government;
Chinese agents often target Taiwanese officials who are motivated by financial gain rather than ideology, while people who are found guilty of spying face lenient punishments in Taiwan, a researcher said on Tuesday. While the law says that foreign agents can be sentenced to death, people who are convicted of spying for Beijing often serve less than nine months in prison because Taiwan does not formally recognize China as a foreign nation, Institute for National Defense and Security Research fellow Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲) said. Many officials and military personnel sell information to China believing it to be of little value, unaware that
The central bank and the US Department of the Treasury on Friday issued a joint statement that both sides agreed to avoid currency manipulation and the use of exchange rates to gain a competitive advantage, and would only intervene in foreign-exchange markets to combat excess volatility and disorderly movements. The central bank also agreed to disclose its foreign-exchange intervention amounts quarterly rather than every six months, starting from next month. It emphasized that the joint statement is unrelated to tariff negotiations between Taipei and Washington, and that the US never requested the appreciation of the New Taiwan dollar during the
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