President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday warned of threats to the nation’s democracy and the importance of free speech as she attended a commemoration ceremony in Keelung for democracy advocate Deng Nan-jung (鄭南榕).
Yesterday’s ceremony, part of Freedom of Expression Day celebrations, marked the 30th anniversary of the death of the publisher, also known as Nylon Deng, by self-immolation in his Taipei office after a 71-day standoff with police, who wanted to arrest him on charges of sedition in January 1989 for publishing a draft “Taiwan Republic Constitution” in his magazine, Freedom Era Weekly.
“[China] wants to use our democracy against us. I simply cannot accept this, and I believe Taiwanese in general would not accept this,” she said.
Photo: Lin Hsin-han, Taipei Times
“As president I will persevere in the fight for democracy,” she said.
Free speech is not an abstract or distant concept, Tsai said, adding that her administration had already begun what Deng had sought by repealing the convictions of more than 4,000 victims of political persecution.
These annulments have been therapy for the families of the victims, she said.
The government would continue to dig up and expose injustices committed during the Martial Law era, and would move one step at a time closer toward the nation that Deng had wanted to live in, she added.
“We must allow free speech to be the shared DNA of Taiwanese. This will be the best way to remember Deng Nan-jung these 30 years later,” she said.
“Disinformation” from outside of the nation had become a credible challenge to the values that Taiwanese hold dear, she said.
Reports that China is recruiting Taiwanese Internet celebrities and buying Taiwanese-owned Facebook pages to use for “united front” efforts to erode the nation’s democracy from the inside have caused alarm in Taiwan, Tsai said.
The threat to Taiwan’s democracy is as credible as the terrorism that threatens European countries, she said.
Democracy should not be taken for granted, and it is important for Taiwanese to be brave and stand up in defense of Taiwan’s freedoms when they are under threat, the president said.
The current generation have not experienced life in Taiwan before democratic elections, but they have fought for democracy during the Wild Strawberries movement and the Sunflower movement, she said.
Ensuring freedom of speech and transitional justice are shared responsibilities of all Taiwanese regardless of generation, gender or affiliation, she said.
The Wild Strawberries movement was a student sit-in that began in front of the Executive Yuan on Nov. 7, 2008, to protest against a ban on the national flag and the playing of Taiwanese songs during a visit by a Chinese delegation led by then-Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) to Taipei.
The Sunflower movement was the 2014 occupation of the Legislative Yuan by students and others against the then-Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government’s efforts to push through legislative approval of the Cross-Strait Service Trade Agreement that had been signed on June 21, 2013, by the Straits Exchange Foundation and ARATS in Shanghai.
Additional reporting by staff writer
PROVOCATIVE: Chinese Deputy Ambassador to the UN Sun Lei accused Japan of sending military vessels to deliberately provoke tensions in the Taiwan Strait China denounced remarks by Japan and the EU about the South China Sea at a UN Security Council meeting on Monday, and accused Tokyo of provocative behavior in the Taiwan Strait and planning military expansion. Ayano Kunimitsu, a Japanese vice foreign minister, told the Council meeting on maritime security that Tokyo was seriously concerned about the situation in the East China and South China seas, and reiterated Japan’s opposition to any attempt to change the “status quo” by force, and obstruction of freedom of navigation and overflight. Stavros Lambrinidis, head of the EU delegation to the UN, also highlighted South China Sea
The final batch of 28 M1A2T Abrams tanks purchased from the US arrived at Taipei Port last night and were transported to the Armor Training Command in Hsinchu County’s Hukou Township (湖口), completing the military’s multi-year procurement of 108 of the tanks. Starting at 12:10am today, reporters observed more than a dozen civilian flatbed trailers departing from Taipei Port, each carrying an M1A2T tank covered with black waterproof tarps. Escorted by military vehicles, the convoy traveled via the West Coast Expressway to the Armor Training Command, with police implementing traffic control. The army operates about 1,000 tanks, including CM-11 Brave Tiger
China on Wednesday teased in a video an aircraft carrier that could be its fourth, and the first using nuclear power, while making an allusion to Taiwan and vowing to further build up its islands, as it looks to boost maritime power, secure resources and bolster territorial claims. The video, issued on the eve of the 77th founding anniversary of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy, featured fictional officers with names that are homophones of three commissioned aircraft carriers, the Liaoning (遼寧), Shandong (山東) and Fujian (福建). Titled Into the Deep, it showed a 19-year-old named “Hejian” (何劍) joining the group, sparking
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, said it expects its 2-nanometer (2nm) chip capacity to grow at a compound annual rate of 70 percent from this year to 2028. The projection comes as five fabs begin volume production of 2-nanometer chips this year — two in Hsinchu and three in Kaohsiung — TSMC senior vice president and deputy cochief operating officer Cliff Hou (侯永清) said at the company’s annual technology symposium in Silicon Valley, California, last week. Output in the first year of 2-nanometer production, which began in the fourth quarter of last year, is expected to
RSS