At 10:25am on Tuesday, a mini-van blaring a loud, political song and sporting a huge placard calling for the resignation of Minister of Foreign Affairs James Huang (
The vehicle, driven by a member of the pro-unification Patriot Association, was making a routine protest outside the Presidential Office. But the situation did not get out of hand, as the presence of watchful presidential guards dissuaded a hysterical, shouting woman from making any move to get out of the vehicle. When the traffic light turned green, the van drove off.
Security at the Presidential Office has been beefed up since July 27, when a 44-year-old man fired 13 flares into the sky in front of the building before driving off.
PHOTO: SEAN CHAO, TAIPEI TIMES
After the incident, the National Security Bureau and Zhongzheng First Police District formed a task force and, using witnesses' partial recollection of the shooter's licence plate number, swiftly identified Chang Han-ming (
However, the incident aroused concerns because of the presidential guards' inability to react quickly enough to apprehend the shooter at the scene.
While the manner in which Chang "protested" outside the Presidential Office is perhaps unique, it has become increasing popular to attack the building with automobiles.
In February this year, a drunk member of the military police accidentally crashed his car into the bushes outside the Presidential Office. He later turned himself in and was charged with endangering public safety.
In December last year, a 42-year-old man rammed into the Presidential Office with a vehicle he rented for the purpose.
A taxi driver suspected of being mentally unstable drove his vehicle into the Presidential Office in August 2003. And a similar incident occurred in June 2003, when a confirmed mentally unstable man smashed his car into the building. He was immediately arrested by presidential guards after the tires of his vehicle were punctured by a spiked security barrier.
Vice President Annette Lu (
The National Security Bureau, however, begs to differ.
Director of the bureau's Public Relations Department Liu Yen-wei (
"While military police and law enforcement officers are responsible for the security of national leaders when they are inside the Presidential Office compound, we are in charge of their safety when they are outside the building," she said.
Ministry of National Defense Spokesman Admiral Wu Chi-fang (
"It is not our responsibility to protect the president and vice president. Our job is to make sure the armed forces do their job," he said.
If the National Security Bureau was not in charge of the security of national leaders, why did it bother coordinating related agencies to ensure their safety, Wu asked.
While it is an indisputable fact that military police are stationed at the Presidential Office to offer protection to national leaders, Wu said that this was because the Minister of National Defense used to work there.
The Ministry of National Defense "had no choice but to comply" when the National Security Bureau asked the ministry to continue the deployment of military police at the Presidential Office after the ministry relocated, he said.
Commenting on the criticism that presidential guards reacted slowly to last month's incident, Wu said that he thought they had done a good job.
"I don't think they made any serious errors in handling the matter," Wu said. "In a democratic country, it is very difficult to prevent such incidents unless the Presidential Office is closed off and motor vehicles are banned from entering its periphery."
Fang Yang-ning (方仰寧), deputy chief of the Taipei City Police Department's Zhongzheng First Police District, said his precinct and the Presidential Office were jointly responsible for the breach of security.
While the National Security Bureau has called a meeting with various agencies to review the incident, Fang refused to disclose any details of the forum.
The Presidential Office said it had beefed up the deployment of presidential guards and that the Zhongzheng First Police District had intensified its patrols. And in a further effort to prevent any similar occurrences, the Presidential Office said it was taking steps to improve its intelligence-gathering and communication with security agencies.
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:
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