The Transitional Justice Commission has gained access to the National Security Bureau’s secret files on 21 cases from the White Terror era, including files on independence advocates Lin I-hsiung (林義雄) and Chen Wen-chen (陳文成).
Commission Acting Chairwoman Yang Tsui (楊翠) said at an international conference on transitional justice in Taipei yesterday that the commission has reviewed the files and would commence interviews with people linked to the incidents.
More than 2,000 documents have been reviewed and new historical facts are being uncovered, she said.
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
On Feb. 28, 1980, Lin was being tried for treason at a military tribunal, when his mother and two seven-year-old twin daughters were stabbed to death at their home.
Chen’s body was found on the campus of National Taiwan University on July 3, 1981, a day after the now-defunct Taiwan Garrison Command claimed to have released him from custody.
No further details would be disclosed for now to avoid compromising the investigations, she said.
Asked about the pace of the commission’s work, Yang said it is following up on multiple leads, but that officials must proceed carefully so that the commission’s findings would be reliable and able to survive legal challenges.
The commission is holding discussions with academics and experts as it prepares long-term plans that it intends to present to the government in May next year, as it does not expect to complete its mission in the allotted two years, she said.
South Korea in 1996 passed a law to investigate government atrocities in the 1980 Gwangju Uprising and its Ministry of National Defense has only recently organized an investigative body, she said, before calling on the public to be patient about transitional justice.
228 Memorial Foundation chairman Hsueh Hua-yuan (薛化元) said that the foundation is drafting a report on Taiwan’s transitional justice project and would submit it for the commission’s consideration later this year.
An English-language translation of the report is expected to be published some time next year, Hsueh added.
SILENCING CRITICS: In addition to blocking Taiwan, China aimed to prevent rights activists from speaking out against authoritarian states, a Cabinet department said The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday condemned transnational repression by Beijing after RightsCon, a major digital human rights conference scheduled to be held in Zambia this week, was abruptly canceled due to Chinese pressure over Taiwanese participation. This year’s RightsCon, the world’s largest conference discussing issues “at the intersection of human rights and technology,” was scheduled to take place from tomorrow to Friday in Lusaka, and expected to draw 2,600 in-person attendees from 150 countries, along with 1,100 online participants. However, organizers were forced to cancel the event due to behind-the-scenes pressure from China, the ministry said, expressing its “strongest condemnation”
Taiwan’s economy grew far faster than expected in the first quarter, as booming demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications drove a surge in exports, spilling over into investment and consumption, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. GDP growth was 13.69 percent year-on-year during the January-to-March period, beating the DGBAS’ February forecast by 2.23 percentage points and marking the most robust growth in nearly four decades, DGBAS senior official Chiang Hsin-yi (江心怡) told a news conference in Taipei. The result was powered by exports, which remain the backbone of Taiwan’s economy, Chiang said. Outbound shipments jumped 51.12 percent year-on-year to
DELAYED BUT DETERMINED: The president’s visit highlights Taiwan’s right to international engagement amid regional pressure from China President Willaim Lai (賴清德) yesterday arrived in Eswatini, more than a week after his planned visit to Taiwan’s sole African ally was suspended because of revoked overflight permits. “The visit, originally scheduled for April 22, was postponed due to unforeseen external factors,” Lai wrote on social media. “After several days of careful arrangements by our diplomatic and national security teams, we successfully arrived today.” Lai said he looked forward to further deepening Taiwan-Eswatini relations through closer cooperation in the economy, agriculture, culture and education, as well as advancing the nation’s international partnerships. The president was initially scheduled to arrive in time to celebrate
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corp (IRGC) yesterday said the US faced a choice between an “impossible” military operation or a “bad deal” with Tehran, after US President Donald Trump disparaged Iran’s latest peace proposal. Negotiations between the two countries have been deadlocked since a ceasefire came into effect on April 8, with only one round of direct peace talks held so far. Iran’s Tasnim and Fars news agencies reported that Tehran had submitted a 14-point proposal to mediator Pakistan, but Trump was quick to cast doubt on it. “I will soon be reviewing the plan that Iran has just sent to us, but
RSS