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Travel book has blue bias: DPP

The first international travel guidebook to focus exclusively on Taipei sparked controversy yesterday as a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei City councilor denounced the city government, saying it had inserted "pan-blue viewpoints" into the book.

The travel book, Insight City Guide: Taipei, uses more than 30 pages to introduce the political situation in Taiwan. In addition to describing the March 19, 2004 assassination attempt on the president and vice president as an "election drama," the book tells its readers that the term "Taiwanese" makes some Mainlanders feel "uncomfortable."

"The Taipei City Government promoted the pan-blues' political viewpoint to foreign tourists through the book ... It turned a simple travel guide into a mouthpiece for the pan-blue camp," DPP Taipei City Councilor Lan Shih-tsung (藍世聰) said yesterday.

Lan said that the content of the travel guide came to his attention after he received a complaint from a resident, who found the "biased comments" in it to be offensive.

"[Taipei City Mayor] Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) called himself a `new Taiwanese' and has been accusing the DPP of bringing up the issue of nationality ... But the city government's publication forced the [domestic] complex about nationalities on foreigners through a travel book," he said.

Ma, who is also the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman, yesterday denied interfering with the content of the book.

"Did the city councilor read the book? Is that book published by the Taipei City Government? Apparently they got it wrong. The book is published by a German company," Ma said.

The book was published by the German Langenscheidt Publishing Group in May.

Taipei is the first Asian city featured in its "Insight City Guide" series.

Ma said the city government explored opportunities to promote the city with various publishing companies, but it only helped promote the book and had not reviewed the content before it was published.

The city government held a press conference in May to introduce the book and invited the company's representative in Singapore to celebrate the publication of the guide.

Ma also wrote the preface for the book, which details the city's major tourist attractions including Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, the 228 Memorial Museum and Taipei 101. Traditional Taiwanese food including stinky tofu, pearl milk tea and oyster omelettes are also featured in the guide.

Ma yesterday said that the book's content reflected "foreign viewpoints" and was "totally independent."

"Calling the 319 incident an `election drama' is a modest description," he said.

In response, Lan said Ma was trying to shift the responsibility.

"Is it necessary for a travel book to mention the 319 incident?" he said.

The city government should not ignore its responsibility as its official logo appeared many times in the book, he added.
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