Presidential Office Spokesman James Huang (黃志芳) yesterday rebuked the 'Washington Post' for distorting President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) words in a report published yesterday.
In the very first paragraph of the online version of the newspaper's interview with Chen — headlined “Taiwan's President maintains hard line: Chen rebukes China in interview” — reporters Philip Pan and David Hoffman wrote that “President Chen Shui-bian declared Monday that his narrow re-election victory was a mandate from voters to press ahead with an aggressive agenda to develop Taiwan as an `independent, sovereign country' despite the risk of war with China.”
Huang said yesterday that Chen did not make the comment during the interview, and that the newspaper's interpretation was incorrect. “The content of the interview is correct,” Huang said yesterday. “But the preamble of the report based on the two reporters' personal interpretation is not.”
The newspaper reported: “Chen's defiant remarks signaled an intent to carry his campaign's tough line toward China into a second term despite the deep divide his approach has created in Taiwanese society and the unease it has caused in the Bush administration.”
“Chen said he would continue to reject the [`one China'] principle in his second term because Beijing defines `one China' as the People's Republic of China and Taiwan as a local government, `which is totally unacceptable to our people.'” the report added.
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