The wife of detained rights activist Lee Ming-che (李明哲) has told the BBC’s Chinese-language Web site that she plans to seek international help to win her husband’s release instead of trying to reach a private understanding with Beijing.
In the interview, which was conducted late last month, but only released on Tuesday, Lee Ching-yu (李凈瑜) talked about how she and her husband met and his health problems.
Lee Ching-yu said her appeals to the international community were aimed at maximizing the exposure for her husband’s case through the media and academics.
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
Lee Ming-che was detained by Chinese authorities after entering Zhuhai via Macau on March 19.
He used to work for the Democratic Progressive Party and is now on the staff of Wenshan Community College in Taipei and a volunteer for a local nongovernmental organization, Covenant Watch.
While China has confirmed he is being held, it has not said why or where, except for vague references to matters related to China’s national security.
In the interview, Lee Ching-yu recounted how a Taiwanese man, Lee Chun-min (李俊敏), who she said was head of the “Cross-strait Exchange Center,” had on April 7 brought her a copy of a letter purportedly from her husband, but she refused to accept it because she though it was fake.
She said she also rejected conditions that Lee Chun-min told her were being offered by the Chinese authorities for the conditional release of her husband because she was afraid Beijing would then accuse him of any number of false charges.
International help is the only way her husband is likely to be released, she told the BBC.
She said she still hopes the government will work with a third country to help win her husband’s freedom.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
The Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted two Taiwanese and issued a wanted notice for Pete Liu (劉作虎), founder of Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus Technology Co (萬普拉斯科技), for allegedly contravening the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) by poaching 70 engineers in Taiwan. Liu allegedly traveled to Taiwan at the end of 2014 and met with a Taiwanese man surnamed Lin (林) to discuss establishing a mobile software research and development (R&D) team in Taiwan, prosecutors said. Without approval from the government, Lin, following Liu’s instructions, recruited more than 70 software
RSS