Carrying model coffins and singing the Tibetan national anthem, dozens of Tibetans and Taiwanese supporters of Tibetan independence yesterday marched along Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei and submitted a petition urging President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to pay more attention to the state of human rights in Tibet.
The activists, who carried the cardboard coffins to symbolize the 28 self-immolations by Tibetans since March last year amid a renewed clampdown by Chinese authorities, condemned the Chinese government for its continuous repression of Tibet and reminded Ma of his previous promise to take an interest in human rights issues in the region.
“President Ma voiced his support for Tibet’s struggle for freedom when running for president in 2008. However, since then, he has not openly shown his support. Taiwan’s closer economic ties with China should not prevent our government from taking a strong stance on human rights in Tibet,” Taiwan Friends of Tibet deputy director Yiong Cong-ziin (楊長鎮) said.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
Amnesty International Taiwan board member Tashi Tsering, an Indian-born Tibetan-Taiwanese, said Tibetans had been fighting for religious freedom and their human rights in a peaceful way and that people were setting themselves on fire because the situation in the region had become unbearable.
“We need to defend our right to religious freedom and ask for the return of [Tibetan spiritual leader] the Dalai Lama,” he said.
“The fight for freedom and human rights in Tibet is not only for Tibetans ... the international community should join us in asking for change in China,” he said.
Police and security guards carefully monitored the group as it later marched from the Taipei Guest House to the Presidential Office to hand over a petition to Ma, calling on him to pay attention to human rights.
A staff member from the Presidential Office’s public relations division received the petition and promised to relay the group’s concerns to Ma.
Ma, who had expressed sympathy for Tibet’s independence movement during the 2008 presidential campaign, rejected a proposal later that year, after he had been elected, for the Dalai Lama to visit the country.
Yang Cheng-shin (楊正欣), a member of Taiwan Students for a Free Tibet, said the group hoped that the president would openly voice his concerns about China’s human rights situation and hold regular meetings with civic groups and human rights advocates to monitor the state of human rights in Tibet.
The group also invited the public to join a rally today in commemoration of the 52nd anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan uprising. The rally is scheduled to begin at 2pm in front of Zhongxiao Fuxing MRT Station.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
‘SPEY’ REACTION: Beijing said its Eastern Theater Command ‘organized troops to monitor and guard the entire process’ of a Taiwan Strait transit China sent 74 warplanes toward Taiwan between late Thursday and early yesterday, 61 of which crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait. It was not clear why so many planes were scrambled, said the Ministry of National Defense, which tabulated the flights. The aircraft were sent in two separate tranches, the ministry said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday “confirmed and welcomed” a transit by the British Royal Navy’s HMS Spey, a River-class offshore patrol vessel, through the Taiwan Strait a day earlier. The ship’s transit “once again [reaffirmed the Strait’s] status as international waters,” the foreign ministry said. “Such transits by