On Feb. 17, the Transitional Justice Commission released its report on the murders of the mother and twin daughters of democracy advocate Lin I-hsiung (林義雄) on Feb. 28, 1980.
The most important finding is that the commission has not ruled out the authoritarian government’s involvement in the murders. Forty years after the killings, evidence has disappeared — either purposefully or unintentionally destroyed. Surprisingly, some documents remain classified, which only underscores the need to review current laws.
An amendment to Article 80 of the Criminal Code last year scrapped the statute of limitations for offenses that result in death. However, Article 8-2 of the Enforcement Act of the Criminal Code (中華民國刑法施行法) stipulates that if “the period of limitation of prosecution of punishment was in progress but not completed before [the amendment takes effect], the post-amended provision shall apply.”
In other words, the amendment applies to cases that have not yet passed the period of limitation, but not cases that have already done so.
In the Lin family murder case, the period of limitation — 30 years — has passed. Even if the murderer is found and is still alive, they cannot be held criminally liable, because the period of limitation has passed.
Due to the impossibility of pursuing criminal liability, transitional justice must now restore the truth as far as possible for later generations to learn from.
However, laws and regulations protecting classified information further aggravate the situation.
Since August 2018, the commission has asked the National Security Bureau for files on 21 cases, including the Lin family murders, the 1979 Kaohsiung Incident and the 1981 death of Carnegie Mellon University associate professor Chen Wen-chen (陳文成).
The commission only gained access to the files on one case, the Lin family murders, and were denied access to the others because — in accordance with Article 12 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法) — “any national security information involving intelligence activities, sources or access shall remain classified permanently.”
If declassifying the files would expose the national security intelligence network, does that mean that Taiwan’s intelligence agencies have made no technical progress or advances in how they gather intelligence?
It is also impossible to imagine what kind of national security information could be listed as “permanently classified.”
The Legislative Yuan last year enacted the Political Archives Act (政治檔案條例) specifically to clear obstacles created by the Classified National Security Information Protection Act.
Article 5 of the new law stipulates that “archives that have been classified for more than 30 years without any legal basis shall be declassified.”
This helps prevent illegal conduct from being covered up by classifying it.
Bewilderingly, the act also gives an exception for political archives when “there is a likelihood that their disclosure would seriously affect national security or foreign relations,” allowing them to remain classified for 50 years.
This vague and ambiguous wording means that key evidence in the Lin family murders is sealed up for another 10 years. Exceptions of this kind are not much different from the permanent classification stipulated in the Classified National Security Information Protection Act.
These exceptions expose the absurdity of the regulations protecting classified information, and legislators should hurry to re-evaluate and abolish them.
Wu Ching-chin is an associate law professor at Aletheia University.
Translated by Chang Ho-ming
From the Iran war and nuclear weapons to tariffs and artificial intelligence, the agenda for this week’s Beijing summit between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is packed. Xi would almost certainly bring up Taiwan, if only to demonstrate his inflexibility on the matter. However, no one needs to meet with Xi face-to-face to understand his stance. A visit to the National Museum of China in Beijing — in particular, the “Road to Rejuvenation” exhibition, which chronicles the rise and rule of the Chinese Communist Party — might be even more revealing. Xi took the members
A Pale View of Hills, a movie released last year, follows the story of a Japanese woman from Nagasaki who moved to Britain in the 1950s with her British husband and daughter from a previous marriage. The daughter was born at a time when memories of the US atomic bombing of Nagasaki during World War II and anxiety over the effects of nuclear radiation still haunted the community. It is a reflection on the legacy of the local and national trauma of the bombing that ended the period of Japanese militarism. A central theme of the movie is the need, at
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on Friday used their legislative majority to push their version of a special defense budget bill to fund the purchase of US military equipment, with the combined spending capped at NT$780 billion (US$24.78 billion). The bill, which fell short of the Executive Yuan’s NT$1.25 trillion request, was passed by a 59-0 margin with 48 abstentions in the 113-seat legislature. KMT Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文), who reportedly met with TPP Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) for a private meeting before holding a joint post-vote news conference, was said to have mobilized her
Before the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its People’s Liberation Army (PLA) can blockade, invade, and destroy the democracy on Taiwan, the CCP seeks to make the world an accomplice to Taiwan’s subjugation by harassing any government that confers any degree of marginal recognition, or defies the CCP’s “One China Principle” diktat that there is no free nation of Taiwan. For United States President Donald Trump’s upcoming May 14, 2026 visit to China, the CCP’s top wish has nothing to do with Trump’s ongoing dismantling of the CCP’s Axis of Evil. The CCP’s first demand is for Trump to cease US
RSS