Chen treatment photos released

The Presidential Office yesterday publicized evidence relating to the attempted assassination of President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) Friday, on the eve of the presidential election, urging people not to believe rumors or indulge in empty speculation but wait for the investigative machinery of the legal system to produce results.

Explaining why photos of the president being treated for his gunshot wound in hospital were not made available on the day of the shooting, Presidential Office Spokesman James Huang (黃志芳) said: "President Chen's first priority after the incident was to ensure national security and social stability, and the reason why these bloody photos were not publicized was because the government did not want to arouse supporters' irrational reactions."

"President Chen indicated that the presidential election should not be affected by the gunshot incident," Huang said. "If we did want to affect the election, we could have released the photos Friday night, which would absolutely have gained a lot of sympathy and affected voters' intentions.

"Therefore, the government appeals to the public to return to their normal lives and just allow the legal system to go ahead," Huang said.

The shooting occurred Friday afternoon, while Chen and Vice President Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) stood side by side on a jeep leading a motorcade through Tainan City.

The pair were immediately escorted to the Chi Mei Medical Center in Tainan County. According to medical staff at the hospital the injuries were not life-threatening and the two remained conscious throughout their treatment.

The pan-blue camp, has however, questioned whether in fact the assassination attempt wasn't a stunt organized to get sympathy for Chen prior to the voting.

The pan-blues claim that voting should not have gone ahead on Saturday and that the election could have been postponed until the facts behind the assassination attempt could be clearly ascertained.

Independent lawmaker Sisy Chen (陳文茜), a DPP renegade working as an advisor to the pan-blue presidential candidate Lien Chan (連戰), held a press conference at the KMT's campaign headquarter at midnight Friday, saying that the hospital had faked the medical records of the president and Lu.

She suggested that the entire incident was a falsified event to try to sway voters. She claimed to have information from "an anonymous nurse" claiming "the national security system was involved in the conspiracy."

The DPP campaign's executive manager Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) condemned the allegations in the strongest terms, saying that such a attitude was "blindly unconscionable."

To further allay opposition parties' doubts about the incident, the Presidential Office yesterday publicized eight photos, showing the process of treatment of the president and the vice president.

The photos show President Chen being sutured on a hospital bed and Lu lying on a hospital bed with a wounded knee.

"This is the first time I have ever shown photos of my patients in a 20-year career, Hsiao Tzu-yu (蕭自裕), doctor of the department of otolaryngology at the National Taiwan University Hospital (台大醫院) said.

Hsiao said that he felt displaying the photos was a serious violation of doctor patient confidentiality and medical ethics.

Huang stressed that some people had spread rumors about the shooting to slander the head of the state, saying that the president was actually not injured and had even demanded to examine the president's stomach.