Former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday called for conditional sharing of historical documents stored on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, as he commemorated the lives lost during the Second Sino-Japanese War.
Ma made the remarks at the launch of a 13-volume book series featuring historical documents from the Republic of China’s (ROC) eight-year war against Japan between 1937 and 1945.
“During my meeting with [Chinese President] Xi Jinping (習近平) on Nov. 7 last year, not only did we talk about international relations and China’s military deployment, we also touched upon the topic of cross-strait sharing of historical documents,” Ma said in a speech at the ceremony held at National Chengchi University, whose Humanities Research Center published the book series.
Photo: Huang Yao-cheng, Taipei Times
However, Ma said such exchanges should be conducted based on a precondition that both sides should make public their historical files without any “restricted zones,” adding that both Academia Historica and the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) Party Archive have been made available to the public.
While there are still some access restrictions to some of the government’s materials due to the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), “we could still deliberate on the possibility of opening them up to the public,” Ma said.
“History should not be just written by our side. It requires cross-strait cooperation,” Ma said.
KMT Chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) arrived at the ceremony 20 minutes before Ma and met briefly with the former president before his speech.
In her speech, Hung said that history regarding the eight-year war must not be distorted or forgotten.
“We paid a dear price during the KMT-led war of resistance, including a split across the Taiwan Strait,” Hung said.
People should look at history with a modest and sincere attitude and to acquire wisdom from it, she said.
Hung said in the current political environment, talking about the Second Sino-Japanese War and former president Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) influence on future generations might be regarded as “politically incorrect” or ridiculed by netizens as living in the past.
“However, if we choose to ignore or forget the anti-Japanese war, which is marked by an inedible and touching part of history that saw the Zhonghua minzu [中華民族, Chinese nation] fight to the end, how could we ever be worthy of the lives, tears and blood that previous generations lost in pursuit of peace and happiness for future generations?” Hung said.
Asked on the sidelines of the ceremony to comment on former vice president Wu Den-yih’s (吳敦義) plan to run for the KMT chairmanship next year, Hung said it has been her consistent stance since she joined the KMT’s presidential primary last year that it is in the interests of the party to see someone willing to shoulder responsibility.
“It is okay to have some competition, as long as they are not struggles,” Hung said.
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