A group of students from the Wild Strawberry Student Movement who were stopped by police on Wednesday on their way to deliver “human rights presents” to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said they decided to sue the officers for violating their freedom.
Minor clashes occurred as students attempted to prevent the officers from taking away their “installation art cabin,” which led to a number of students being injured. Police later confiscated the cabin.
The students said they would also sue the officers for “inflicting injuries on them and embezzling the cabin.”
The incident started when the students, wearing red Christmas hats, carried their cabin stuffed with Chapter Two of the Constitution — a chapter about citizen’s rights and obligations — the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and copies of the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法), as their Christmas presents for Ma.
The students responsible for delivering the “presents” set off from the Nanchang Park and headed to the Presidential Office along Guling Street and Nanhai Road.
Police stopped them near Chongqing S Road, Sec. 2
The police ordered them to leave on the grounds that their rally constituted an illegal assembly. The students tried to persuade police that they were delivering “presents” to the Presidential Office. But the police continued to block them, adding that they were violating the law by blocking traffic during rush hour with the 2m cabin.
The students later sent several representatives to communicate with the Presidential Office, which agreed that the cabin could be delivered there during office hours yesterday. Minor clashes occurred, however, when police officers from the Zhongzheng Second Precinct forcefully removed the cabin.
In a related development, the Wild Strawberry Student Movement yesterday called on its participants to attend the memorial service of Liu Po-yen (劉柏煙), a former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) member who passed away last week after self-immolating in protest against Ma at the Liberty Square of the Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall last month.
The memorial will be held in Nantou on Jan. 3.
Taiwan would benefit from more integrated military strategies and deployments if the US and its allies treat the East China Sea, the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea as a “single theater of operations,” a Taiwanese military expert said yesterday. Shen Ming-shih (沈明室), a researcher at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said he made the assessment after two Japanese military experts warned of emerging threats from China based on a drill conducted this month by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) Eastern Theater Command. Japan Institute for National Fundamentals researcher Maki Nakagawa said the drill differed from the
‘WORSE THAN COMMUNISTS’: President William Lai has cracked down on his political enemies and has attempted to exterminate all opposition forces, the chairman said The legislature would motion for a presidential recall after May 20, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday at a protest themed “against green communists and dictatorship” in Taipei. Taiwan is supposed to be a peaceful homeland where people are united, but President William Lai (賴清德) has been polarizing and tearing apart society since his inauguration, Chu said. Lai must show his commitment to his job, otherwise a referendum could be initiated to recall him, he said. Democracy means the rule of the people, not the rule of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), but Lai has failed to fulfill his
A rally held by opposition parties yesterday demonstrates that Taiwan is a democratic country, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday, adding that if opposition parties really want to fight dictatorship, they should fight it on Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) held a protest with the theme “against green communists and dictatorship,” and was joined by the Taiwan People’s Party. Lai said the opposition parties are against what they called the “green communists,” but do not fight against the “Chinese communists,” adding that if they really want to fight dictatorship, they should go to the right place and face
A 79-year-old woman died today after being struck by a train at a level crossing in Taoyuan, police said. The woman, identified by her surname Wang (王), crossed the tracks even though the barriers were down in Jhongli District’s (中壢) Neili (內壢) area, the Taoyuan Branch of the Railway Police Bureau said. Surveillance footage showed that the railway barriers were lowered when Wang entered the crossing, but why she ventured onto the track remains under investigation, the police said. Police said they received a report of an incident at 6:41am involving local train No. 2133 that was heading from Keelung to Chiayi City. Investigators
RSS