It should come as no surprise that human rights advocate Lee Ming-che (李明哲) pleaded guilty to the Chinese authorities’ charge of “subversion of state power” during a court hearing in China’s Hunan Province yesterday.
Lee’s wife, Lee Ching-yu (李凈瑜), on Saturday had asked Taiwanese for understanding and forgiveness if her husband said anything unbearable in court against his will, adding: “This is just the Chinese government being adept at forcing confessions.”
Indeed. The Beijing authorities can claim all they like that Chinese trials are open and transparent, but the truth is that the judiciary, in a country ruled by an authoritarian regime, is a pretense and a tool for oppression.
People who argue otherwise need to look no further than Lee Ming-che’s imprisonment on suspicion of “engaging in activities that endanger national security,” despite Beijing providing no evidence of wrongdoing, after his forced disappearance on March 19.
Taiwan’s government wants to secure Lee Ming-che’s safety and release, so it is understandable that it has remained cautious and low-key to avoid complicating the process.
However, believing that mianzi (“face,” 面子) plays an integral part in Chinese customs, Taiwanese officials seem to have harbored a misconception that if they take a reserved approach toward China, Beijing would be given the facade of “saving face,” and it would then be more agreeable to sitting at the negotiating table.
However, this kind of soft approach only works to fuel China’s arrogance.
As a Chinese proverb says: “Kill some chickens to scare the monkeys” — intimidation, arbitrary detention and the like are nothing new in an authoritarian regime that crushes and demonizes dissidents. With forced disappearances becoming a frequent method used by Beijing to silence and intimidate people critical of the Chinese Communist Party, it is obvious what it wishes to achieve with these sorts of fear-mongering tactics.
The tactics have their underlying effects — Lee Ming-che’s situation is in the minds of many Taiwanese who are wondering if the same thing could happen to them.
The case could set a dangerous precedent, where “Taiwanese could be arrested in China for what they said or did in Taiwan,” as Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus secretary-general Lin Wei-chou (林為洲) said yesterday.
Regardless of whether someone advocates Taiwanese independence, the person could be arbitrarily detained by Chinese authorities and charged with subversion of state power for being critical of the Chinese government.
Taiwan, a nation that takes pride in its democracy and respect for freedom of expression, should be vocal about human rights violations.
Instead of laying low, the government should broadcast the case to the international community to assert collective pressure on China.
A soft touch is useless in dealing with an autocratic regime. The government should stop behaving like an ostrich with its head in the sand, issuing meek rhetoric. It needs to be tougher in its dealings with China.
By being servile in the face of an authoritarian regime, the government is turning itself into an accomplice of injustice.
There is much evidence that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is sending soldiers from the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — and is learning lessons for a future war against Taiwan. Until now, the CCP has claimed that they have not sent PLA personnel to support Russian aggression. On 18 April, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelinskiy announced that the CCP is supplying war supplies such as gunpowder, artillery, and weapons subcomponents to Russia. When Zelinskiy announced on 9 April that the Ukrainian Army had captured two Chinese nationals fighting with Russians on the front line with details
Within Taiwan’s education system exists a long-standing and deep-rooted culture of falsification. In the past month, a large number of “ghost signatures” — signatures using the names of deceased people — appeared on recall petitions submitted by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) against Democratic Progressive Party legislators Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) and Wu Pei-yi (吳沛憶). An investigation revealed a high degree of overlap between the deceased signatories and the KMT’s membership roster. It also showed that documents had been forged. However, that culture of cheating and fabrication did not just appear out of thin air — it is linked to the
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), joined by the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), held a protest on Saturday on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei. They were essentially standing for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which is anxious about the mass recall campaign against KMT legislators. President William Lai (賴清德) said that if the opposition parties truly wanted to fight dictatorship, they should do so in Tiananmen Square — and at the very least, refrain from groveling to Chinese officials during their visits to China, alluding to meetings between KMT members and Chinese authorities. Now that China has been defined as a foreign hostile force,
On April 19, former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) gave a public speech, his first in about 17 years. During the address at the Ketagalan Institute in Taipei, Chen’s words were vague and his tone was sour. He said that democracy should not be used as an echo chamber for a single politician, that people must be tolerant of other views, that the president should not act as a dictator and that the judiciary should not get involved in politics. He then went on to say that others with different opinions should not be criticized as “XX fellow travelers,” in reference to
RSS