Taiwan still stands as a beacon of hope for the rule of law and democratic development in Asia but recent government-related human rights violations have caused its rays to shine less brightly, said David Kilgour, a Canadian human rights lawyer, urging the public to closely monitor the administration in order to safeguard the country’s democracy.
Kilgour, the vice president of the Taiwan-Canadian Friendship Group in the Canadian parliament, a well-known international human rights lawyer and activist and a former prosecutor, was one of the invited speakers at the International Forum on the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of human Rights held in Kaohsiung City on Thursday.
Citing the example of police brutality and riots last month during the visit of Chinese envoy Chen Yunlin (陳雲林), Kilgour said many friends of Taiwan were concerned about dramatic deteriorations in the rule-of-law, human dignity and democratic practices in Taiwan in recent months.
“To tell people that they couldn’t wear ‘I love Taiwan’ T-shirts or hold the national flag was ridiculous,” he said in an interview with Taipei Times.
“I hope President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), a Harvard-trained man, will understand that democracy is more than about having elections every four years. Democracy is about things such as allowing people to protest peacefully,” he said.
It has been reported that more than 100 people, including protestors, lawmakers and policemen, were hospitalized for various injuries in protests during Chen’s visit. One police officer had a stroke and a television reporter was badly beaten.
Kilgour also voiced concerns over the “preventative detention” allowed by the Taiwanese legal system in which a number of former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) figures, including former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), were incarcerated before a formal indictment had been handed down.
Quoting Ma’s Harvard law professor Jerome Cohen, Kilgour said preventative detention should be rarely used, stressing it should only be invoked in infrequent exceptions when the person is denied bail and has been deemed by the court as a potential flight risk or presents the potential of colluding with others.
He urged Minister of Justice Wang Ching-feng (王清峰) to promptly provide substantive answers to inquiries raised by many legal scholars and human rights activists both in Taiwan and abroad.
“It is surprising to many that Mr. Ma, a Harvard law graduate, does not understand these things. I hope that he will show us from now on that he does understand the nature of an open rule of law society,” Kilgour said.
He also urged Ma to disclose his reason why he objected to a visit by the Dalai Lama, calling the rejection a “slight to the 23 million people in Taiwan.”
In a press conference with foreign media last month, when asked about a possible visit by the much revered Tibetan spiritual leader, Ma said “the timing is not right.”
The answer appeared to be an about face to the support he voiced for the Tibetan movement in April during the presidential campaign.
Taiwan, along with the rest of international community, must not be discouraged from condemning Beijing’s human rights abuses for fear of harming trade relations with China, Kilgour said.
History has shown that countries that have publicly criticized actions have not suffered strained economic ties with Beijing, citing Denmark, France and the Netherlands for example.
“Whenever someone is told they were going to lose business if they meet the Dalai Lama, those [threats] almost all prove to be bluffs later on,” he said.
Taiwan as a beacon of rule of law and democracy is “shining less brightly” now and the government and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), especially, must try harder to polish Taiwan’s image especially given its totalitarian past, he said.
“Democracy is more than elections. It includes civil society and checks on any government in office in any national capital,” Kilgour said. “The people of Taiwan should keep an eye on the Ma and any other government you elect to ensure that your hard-won democracy and dignity of all Taiwanese are strengthened, rather than focusing on appeasing the party-state in Beijing.”
ALIGNED THINKING: Taiwan and Japan have a mutual interest in trade, culture and engineering, and can work together for stability, Cho Jung-tai said Taiwan and Japan are two like-minded countries willing to work together to form a “safety barrier” in the Indo-Pacific region, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday said at the opening ceremony of the 35th Taiwan-Japan Modern Engineering and Technology Symposium in Taipei. Taiwan and Japan are close geographically and closer emotionally, he added. Citing the overflowing of a barrier lake in the Mataian River (馬太鞍溪) in September, Cho said the submersible water level sensors given by Japan during the disaster helped Taiwan monitor the lake’s water levels more accurately. Japan also provided a lot of vaccines early in the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic,
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) on Monday announced light shows and themed traffic lights to welcome fans of South Korean pop group Twice to the port city. The group is to play Kaohsiung on Saturday as part of its “This Is For” world tour. It would be the group’s first performance in Taiwan since its debut 10 years ago. The all-female group consists of five South Koreans, three Japanese and Tainan’s Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. To promote the group’s arrival, the city has been holding a series of events, including a pop-up
TEMPORAL/SPIRITUAL: Beijing’s claim that the next Buddhist leader must come from China is a heavy-handed political maneuver that will fall flat-faced, experts said China’s requirement that the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation to be born in China and approved by Beijing has drawn criticism, with experts at a forum in Taipei yesterday saying that if Beijing were to put forth its own Dalai Lama, the person would not be recognized by the Tibetan Buddhist community. The experts made a remarks at the two-day forum hosted by the Tibet Religious Foundation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama titled: “The Snow Land Forum: Finding Common Ground on Tibet.” China says it has the right to determine the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation, as it claims sovereignty over Tibet since ancient times,
Temperatures in some parts of Taiwan are expected to fall sharply to lows of 15°C later this week as seasonal northeasterly winds strengthen, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. It is to be the strongest cold wave to affect northern Taiwan this autumn, while Chiayi County in the southwest and some parts of central Taiwan are likely to also see lower temperatures due to radiational cooling, which occurs under conditions of clear skies, light winds and dry weather, the CWA said. Across Taiwan, temperatures are to fall gradually this week, dropping to 15°C to 16°C in the early hours of Wednesday
RSS