The Transitional Justice Commission is considering donating statues of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) to willing communities, repurposing them as art or replacing them with statues of locally born people, commission Acting Chairwoman Yang Tsui (楊翠) said on Wednesday.
There is more than one way to deal with authoritarian symbols such as statues of Chiang Kai-shek and former president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國), she said.
That could mean removing them, replacing them with statues of local historical or literary figures, converting them into installation art or giving them to former military dependents’ villages that might be interested in “adopting” them, she said.
Photo: Chen Yu-fu, Taipei Times
While removing the statues would be an option, it would not be the only one, she said.
The commission would consult experts and other government agencies before deciding what to do with the statues, she added.
While speaking to reporters in Taipei, Yang also called for more social dialogue on the issue.
The commission is planning to host a series of forums nationwide after the Nov. 24 nine-in-one elections, she said.
It would invite local residents to discuss the relationship between authoritarian symbols, the private sphere and everyday life, and ask local historians to explore the relationship between authoritarian symbols and historical memory, she said.
Through these discussions, the commission would gather ideas for dealing with the authoritarian symbols, she added.
There are more than 1,000 statues of Chiang Kai-shek in Taiwan, the commission said in its latest update.
However, this is not a final number, as the Hualien County Government and the Keelung City Government have yet to report the number of Chiang Kai-shek statues in their jurisdictions, Yang said, adding that they are expected to do so after the elections.
In related news, a representative from the Executive Yuan appeared in court on Wednesday after the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus applied for a provisional injunction to terminate the appointment of Yang as acting commission chair due to concerns over the legality of the move.
The KMT caucus said the regulations on the formation of the commission do not specify how an acting chairperson or deputy chairperson should be appointed.
The representative said Yang’s appointment by Premier William Lai (賴清德) last month was an internal personnel matter that the judiciary should not interfere with.
If the commission had no acting chairperson, it would be unable to carry on its daily activities, they said.
The presiding judge asked the representative which law requires a chairperson to be present when the commission meets, asking: “Is there no one else who can chair the meeting apart from the commission chairperson?”
As the representative did not give an answer, the court asked for a response within three days.
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
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.
‘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
Taiwan is doing everything it can to prevent a military conflict with China, including building up asymmetric defense capabilities and fortifying public resilience, Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) said in a recent interview. “Everything we are doing is to prevent a conflict from happening, whether it is 2027 or before that or beyond that,” Hsiao told American podcaster Shawn Ryan of the Shawn Ryan Show. She was referring to a timeline cited by several US military and intelligence officials, who said Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had instructed the Chinese People’s Liberation Army to be ready to take military action against Taiwan
RSS