Attorneys for The Journalist magazine yesterday tried to persuade Supreme Court judges that the Constitution covers both criminal and civil cases, while Vice Presi-dent Annette Lu's (
To decide whether the verdict of the libel suit brought by Lu against The Journalist should be upheld or the Taiwan High Court should rehear it, the Supreme Court's Civil Department yesterday held a debate for the two sides' lawyers to defend their arguments and try to persuade five Supreme Court Judges -- Lin Chi-fu (
PHOTO: TAIPEI NEWS PHOTOGRAPHER ASSOCIATION
Lu sued the magazine for publishing a story in November 2000 that said she had called its editor-in-chief to spread a rumor that President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) was having an affair with one of his aides.
The judges did not summon Lu or any of the defendants, but the magazine's president, Wang Chien-chuang (
Lu's five attorneys are all familiar faces who have frequently defended the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and its members, including Wellington Koo (
Koo and Hung are also repre-senting the DPP in the lawsuit brought by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)-People First Party alliance requesting a recount of the March 20 election ballots.
The Journalist was represented by Lo Ming-tung (
Lo said that Articles 11 and 22 of the Constitution should cover the case and that was why the magazine decided to appeal the verdict.
Article 11 states, "The people shall have freedom of speech, teaching, writing and publication."
Article 22 says, "All other freedoms and rights of the people that are not detrimental to social order or public welfare shall be guaranteed under the Constitution."
"Reporters are responsible for reporting, not investigating," Lo said.
Lo also declared: "It is impossible for reporters to come up with `100 percent accurate' stories."
"The plaintiff's civil claim could sink the entire magazine since it is quite impossible for it to afford the claim," he said.
In response to Lo's arguments, Koo said his client's bottom line was the demand for an apology.
"Our major argument is to ask for a proper apology. That is all," Koo said.
"We know that the defendants may not be able afford so much, but the second verdict by the high court has marginalized the penalty, did it not? We are merely requesting the defendants to make it up to Lu for the damage they have done," he said.
The debate lasted nearly two and a half hours, but the atmosphere was calm.
Lin, the presiding judge, said that a decision would be announced tomorrow at 10am.
According to Lu's original civil claim, which was upheld by the district court, the defendants -- Wang, editor-in-chief Yang Chao (
The cost of printing such clarifications has been estimated at NT$180 million.
The Taiwan High Court reduced the penalty and ruled that the defendants only needed to buy half-page ads on the front pages of four major Chinese-language newspapers to publish a clarification for one day. That would cost about NT$3.86 million.
The court ruled the clarification did not have to be aired over the radio and TV for three days, taking into account the defendants' in- ability to pay for such a large amount of air time.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching