Just one day after Vice President Lien Chan (
During a meeting of the Finance Committee yesterday to examine the National Security Foundation Act, Chien Shih-chieh, a DPP lawmaker, was set upon by KMT lawmaker Lin Ming-yi (
Initially, Chien and Lin were merely engaged in verbal sparring over these accusations, after which many lawmakers left the room. Chien then requested the chairman call for order. It was at this moment that Lin approached Chien and accused him of disrupting the meeting. Lin then grabbed Chien by the neck and the two wrestled amid efforts by other lawmakers to separate them. Lo also joined in the melee.
PHOTO:YEH JEN-HAO, LIBERTY TIMES
After the groups had been separated, Lin and Lo demanded that Chien apologize for what they said were his groundless accusations against them.
When Chien left the room, Lin and Lo pursued him. The incident up to this point had been recorded live by TV cameras and broadcast nationwide.
What the cameras did not show, however, was what occurred after the three left the conference room. According to Chien, Lin punched him on the chin. Both Lin and Lo deny this.
Yesterday's violence follows a series of news conferences and public hearings held by Chien in which he has accused several lawmakers of being members of what he describes as the "grey faction" -- that is, that they stand somewhere between "white" corrupt officials and "black" gangsters, and who have tried to manipulate politics in the Legislative Yuan by using intimidation tactics to push through revisions of laws for the benefit of the KMT.
Chien accused both Lin and Lo of being members of this "grey faction" and of having engaged in illegal land speculation and in pushing through the so-called "Gambling Article," which passed during the last legislative session.
After the fight in the Legislative Yuan, Lo stressed that Chien had no evidence to prove his accusations. He said that Chien had only sought to discredit them to benefit his own political career.
"Chien was just talking too freely and has lied to the public. We cannot accept his insults," Lo said.
In the light of Vice President Lien Chan's promises to end gangster involvement in politics, the DPP's legislative caucus immediately condemned the KMT, saying it is "two faced," pledging to reform Taiwan's politics on the one hand while conniving with party members to use violence in the legislature as an intimidatory tactic.
"The formal declaration of war against money politics and gang-sters by Lien Chan on Sunday was merely `bullshit' (放屁)," said Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁), a DPP caucus leader.
"The KMT has vowed to eliminate gangsters, but on the other hand it allows members of the legislature to use force publicly on the floor of the Legislative Yuan," he added.
Chien said that what Lin and Lo did to him was evidence enough to prove they were members of the "grey faction."
"Lin's punches would have been even heavier if he had not been restrained," Chien said.
DPP lawmaker Michael Tsai (
During recent years, DPP lawmakers have asserted that certain KMT lawmakers have used violence against members of their party. They claim legislator Su Huan-chih (蘇煥智) was punched by Lin during a speech in the legislature and that Lai Chin-lin (賴勁麟) had been kicked by the KMT's Allen Tseng (曾振農) last year in another highly-publicized incident.
See Also:
Editorial
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
Taiwan yesterday denied Chinese allegations that its military was behind a cyberattack on a technology company in Guangzhou, after city authorities issued warrants for 20 suspects. The Guangzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau earlier yesterday issued warrants for 20 people it identified as members of the Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command (ICEFCOM). The bureau alleged they were behind a May 20 cyberattack targeting the backend system of a self-service facility at the company. “ICEFCOM, under Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, directed the illegal attack,” the warrant says. The bureau placed a bounty of 10,000 yuan (US$1,392) on each of the 20 people named in
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification