Two Taiwanese journalists yesterday received official media accreditation for the UN's World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) which did not identify them as being from China.
It was the first time Taiwanese journalists have received official press passes from the UN which did not identify Taiwan as being part of China.
The press pass issued yesterday to Taipei Times reporter Chiu Yu-tzu (
On the press pass issued to Chung Lee-hua (
The press passes were issued after pressure from the international media, including from the Japanese daily Yomiuri Shimbun.
Thousands of journalist from more than 100 countries have been arriving in Johannesburg to cover the summit, which starts today, and its side events, such as the Civil Society Global Forum.
More than 60,000 participants, including heads of state, lawmakers, leaders of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and business leaders will participate in the summit, which runs through Sept. 4.
Members of the Taiwanese media, however, had been excluded by the WSSD Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit, which declined to say why.
On Saturday, the unit asked journalists from the Taipei Times and the Liberty Times to wait for a UN official who was said to be in charge of the unit to review their applications.
After waiting for two hours, the two journalists left and returned some time later, when they were told their applications had been turned down because the official in charge of the unit did not recognize the country they were from.
The day before, four other applications filed by print and broadcast reporters from Taiwan were also rejected by the media accreditation unit.
The four eventually received WSSD passes as representatives of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) rather than for the media after changing the status registered on their applications.
After hearing that the unit had rejected the applications by Taiwanese journalists, Yutaka Ishiguro (
"It's ironic," Ishiguro told the Taipei Times on Saturday, after hearing no response from the UN officials. "The UN should not treat the media covering global sustainable development politically."
Ishiguro said yesterday that Susan Markham, a spokeswoman for the WSSD, had promised to investigate after admitting that the UN had a stereotype of Taiwan, which is not a member of the UN.
"If the UN wants to discuss climate change, sustainable development and other global issues sincerely, it should not exclude any country," Ishiguro said yesterday after the two newspaper reporters were given official accreditation.
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