Tseng Yen-wei (
During the campaign for the Taipei County commissioner election in 2005, Tseng, a university student at the time, created a blog satirizing Chou, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate.
Now 24 years old, Tseng is a graduate student at National Taiwan Normal University.
Although Chou was elected, he filed a lawsuit against Tseng for "spreading rumors or untrue statements" with the "intention of preventing a candidate's election," and copyright violation.
CHARGES
The first two charges were based on an entry on Tseng's blog about a loan dispute between a bank and Yung-chou Corporation.
Democratic Progressive Party legislative candidate Lo Wen-chia (
IMITATION
The copyright violation action was based on Chou's claim that the name of Tseng's Web site, "Wiego's blog," imitated Chou's official campaign Web site "Weigo's blog."
Earlier this month in court, Chou requested NT$50 million (US$1.5 million) in compensation in addition to criminal charges, and asked Tseng to run apology ads in three Chinese-language newspapers for three consecutive days, Tseng said.
"I don't understand why a politician -- and commissioner of the biggest county in Taiwan -- would do something like this to a student," Tseng said at the press conference.
"Of course he [Chou] knows that I don't have NT$50 million, so he's asking for the amount with the intention of putting me in debt for my entire life," Tseng said.
Lo, as well as bloggers in support of Tseng, accompanied him at the press conference.
"Tseng only quoted me on his blog in the entry on the Yung-chou case," Lo said. "Chou should have sued me, not Tseng."
Tseng said that both he and his family are suffering as a result of the lawsuit.
"If I'm declared guilty next Monday, no one would ever dare criticize politicians on the Internet again."
The Executive Yuan yesterday announced that registration for a one-time universal NT$10,000 cash handout to help people in Taiwan survive US tariffs and inflation would start on Nov. 5, with payouts available as early as Nov. 12. Who is eligible for the handout? Registered Taiwanese nationals are eligible, including those born in Taiwan before April 30 next year with a birth certificate. Non-registered nationals with residence permits, foreign permanent residents and foreign spouses of Taiwanese citizens with residence permits also qualify for the handouts. For people who meet the eligibility requirements, but passed away between yesterday and April 30 next year, surviving family members
The German city of Hamburg on Oct. 14 named a bridge “Kaohsiung-Brucke” after the Taiwanese city of Kaohsiung. The footbridge, formerly known as F566, is to the east of the Speicherstadt, the world’s largest warehouse district, and connects the Dar-es-Salaam-Platz to the Brooktorpromenade near the Port of Hamburg on the Elbe River. Timo Fischer, a Free Democratic Party member of the Hamburg-Mitte District Assembly, in May last year proposed the name change with support from members of the Social Democratic Party and the Christian Democratic Union. Kaohsiung and Hamburg in 1999 inked a sister city agreement, but despite more than a quarter-century of
Taiwanese officials are courting podcasters and influencers aligned with US President Donald Trump as they grow more worried the US leader could undermine Taiwanese interests in talks with China, people familiar with the matter said. Trump has said Taiwan would likely be on the agenda when he is expected to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) next week in a bid to resolve persistent trade tensions. China has asked the White House to officially declare it “opposes” Taiwanese independence, Bloomberg reported last month, a concession that would mark a major diplomatic win for Beijing. President William Lai (賴清德) and his top officials
‘ONE CHINA’: A statement that Berlin decides its own China policy did not seem to sit well with Beijing, which offered only one meeting with the German official German Minister for Foreign Affairs Johann Wadephul’s trip to China has been canceled, a spokesperson for his ministry said yesterday, amid rising tensions between the two nations, including over Taiwan. Wadephul had planned to address Chinese curbs on rare earths during his visit, but his comments about Berlin deciding on the “design” of its “one China” policy ahead of the trip appear to have rankled China. Asked about Wadephul’s comments, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Guo Jiakun (郭嘉昆) said the “one China principle” has “no room for any self-definition.” In the interview published on Thursday, Wadephul said he would urge China to
RSS