The Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) ties with China and its unwillingness to abandon its legacy pose challenges to transitional justice, Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Committee Chairman Wellington Koo (顧立雄) said yesterday.
Speaking in Taipei at an event on transitional justice, Koo said the KMT is much stronger than East Germany’s ruling Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED), to which it is often compared in reference to transitional justice.
Saying that the essence of transitional justice is seeking historical facts, reconciliation and justice, Koo expressed dismay at what he called resistance to such efforts in Taiwan, adding that the pursuits are often misinterpreted as political conflict.
Photo: CNA
Justice must be pursued in a timely fashion to prevent the efforts from losing steam, Koo said.
Comparing the KMT with the SED, Koo said both parties have reacted similarly to investigations into their assets by filing lawsuits at every step, adding that Germany’s party assets investigation committee tirelessly persisted in the face of these obstructions.
“However, Taiwan and Germany have three major differences: Records were dug up immediately following the collapse of East Germany ... but here the records were lost. [In Taiwan] assets were concentrated in the hands of a few following democratization ... [and] the KMT is much more powerful than the SED was,” Koo said.
Koo said the KMT differs from the SED in that it has its own media outlets that voice its position on the issue of unification with China.
Transitional justice measures in post-unification Germany differed greatly in that they did not face the same issues when dealing with the legacy of an authoritarian party, Koo said.
Even after Taiwan transitioned from a nation where protests were violently suppressed, the KMT continued to hold executive, legislative and judicial power, Koo said, adding that obstructions to transitional justice are the natural outcome of that situation.
In that situation “there will never be a judge who says: ‘I completely understand transitional justice,’” Koo said.
He said that the KMT once “sat atop a pedestal,” adding that it can only understand the will of the public when it is on the same level as other parties.
Koo cited the KMT’s previous annual personnel expenses, which were as high as NT$3.2 billion (US$104.4 million), adding that the party’s current staff of 300 is more reasonable for a political party.
Aside from the investigation into its assets, the KMT must face up to its past, Koo said, adding that even the removal of a statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) in Tainan was marred with protests.
“However, I believe everything should be fine; we just need to take it one step at a time,” Koo said.
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
RSS