Scuffles broke out yesterday as two Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) members who attempted to interrupt the Taipei-Shanghai Forum at the Regent Taipei hotel were detained in the hotel by police before being taken away.
About 30 TSU members rallied in front of the hotel before the forum started, demanding that the Chinese delegation led by Shanghai Municipal Committee United Front Work Department Director Sha Hailin (沙海林) leave Taiwan.
Saying that all official ties have been suspended by Beijing after the Democratic Progressive Party became the ruling party in May, former TSU legislator Chou Ni-an (周倪安) said that Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) could have reached surreptitious agreements with China to get the delegation to agree to participate in the forum.
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
“Acknowledge ‘one China’ if you want to carry out exchanges. This is what China said. Did you [Ko] acknowledge it? What did you say on Taipei residents’ behalf?” Chou said.
The protesters tore up two large photographs of Ko and Sha, and set them on fire.
Shortly after Ko and Sha left the hotel, TSU Department of Youth Affairs director Chang Chao-lin (張兆林) and Chihlee University of Technology student and TSU member Wang Hung-yu (王宏裕), who had been surrounded by a group of police officers and detained in the hotel for two hours, were pushed into two police vehicles and taken away.
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
The trio loudly protested that they had not broken any laws as they were escorted out of the hotel and into the vehicles.
Chang and Wang, who were later released, had planned to storm the conference hall where the forum was being held held to protest against Sha’s visit.
They had hidden themselves on the 12th floor of the hotel before the forum began, but their hiding placed was discovered by police deployed in the hotel, Chang said.
He said that at least 40 police officers rushed to corner him and Wang, and detained them for two hours.
“The police told me that we could not leave before Ko and Sha,” Chang said.
He accused the police officers of illegally restricting his personal freedom.
The way they had been treated by the police felt like martial law had been reimposed, he said.
“After Sha arrived, Ko has become more authoritarian than the CCP,” he said.
However, Taipei Police Department Zhongshan Precinct deputy chief Tsai Pao-chiao (蔡寶嬌) said that the duo were detained due to safety concerns.
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