Participants in an April protest against pension reform yesterday denied charges of “obstructing freedom,” accusing the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) of engaging in “political persecution.
National Federation of Teachers’ Unions director-general Huang Yao-nan (黃耀南) and Taipei General Company Union (台北企業總工會) president Wang Yu-wen (王裕文) were summoned to the Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office for questioning as part of an investigation into charges by DPP Legislator Wang Ding-yu (王定宇) that they obstructed his freedom during a protest against pension reform on April 19.
Demonstrators attempted to surround the Legislative Yuan and block entrances to prevent legislators from attending hearings on pension reform legislation.
Photo: Chien Li-chung, Taipei Times
Pushing and shoving erupted when Huang, Wang Yu-wen and other demonstrators discovered that Wang Ding-yu and several other DPP legislators tried to circumvent the protest by entering through the Control Yuan, which is linked by passages to the Legislative Yuan complex.
Huang yesterday denied the charges, calling on prosecutors and judges to save “innocent citizens” from political persecution.
“We only approached Wang [Ding-yu] to present a petition because his public comments on reform revealed some misunderstanding,” Huang said, while adding that the charges should be dismissed because the lawmaker was still able to enter the Control Yuan.
“We were pushed aside by the police and did not affect his freedom of movement,” he said.
“We were all on site and did not see them do anything,” National Association of Retired Teachers president Chang Mei-ing (張美英) said, alleging that Huang and Wang had been targeted as leaders of the protest.
Three protesters were formally charged last week in connection with the Legislative Yuan protest.
Taiwanese Veteran Rights Protection Association secretary-general Chiu Po-jung (邱柏榕) protested against the fines levied on him and other organizers of an April protest outside the Ministry of National Defense, saying he had been “framed.”
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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