The Transitional Justice Commission is expected to exonerate 1,505 people who were persecuted during the White Terror era, including former legislator Hsieh Tsung-min (謝聰敏) and Aboriginal rights advocate Uyongu’e Yatauyungana (高一生), who was executed for espionage.
A ceremony is to be held at the Jingmei White Terror Memorial Park in New Taipei City on Dec. 9, the day before World Human Rights Day, the commission said.
On Oct. 5, a ceremony marked 1,270 exonerations, with those people the first to have their names cleared on its authority, commission spokeswoman Yeh Hung-ling (葉虹靈) said on Thursday.
The next round of exonerations is to include people killed in the 228 Incident, people who were wrongly convicted of espionage or sedition during the Martial Law period and others who did not fit into those groups, but are nevertheless verified to have been persecuted, Yeh said.
Most of the 1,505 cases qualify for compensation from the Improper Martial Law Period Insurgency and Espionage Convictions Compensation Foundation, sources said.
In 1964, Hsieh was arrested on suspicion of treason after having drafted the “Declaration of Formosan Self-Salvation” with Peng Ming-min (彭明敏) and Wei Ting-chao (魏廷朝), the commission said.
Hsieh was not executed after author Lei Chen (雷震), human rights attorney Tien Chao-ming (田朝明) and the US embassy petitioned on his behalf, and he played a major role in calling for the rehabilitation of dissidents after martial law ended, it said.
However, Hsieh remained a guilty man in the eyes of the law, a situation that is to be rectified next month, the commission said.
Additionally, the commission is to clear the name of Uyongu’e, who was imprisoned on trumped-up corruption charges and executed in 1954 alongside several others of Aboriginal descent, it said.
FINAL COUNTDOWN: About 50,000 attended a pro-recall rally yesterday, while the KMT and the TPP plan to rally against the recall votes today Democracy activists, together with arts and education representatives, yesterday organized a motorcade, while thousands gathered on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei in the evening in support of tomorrow’s recall votes. Recall votes for 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers and suspended Hsinchu City mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) are to be held tomorrow, while recall votes for seven other KMT lawmakers are scheduled for Aug. 23. The afternoon motorcade was led by the Spring Breeze Culture and Arts Foundation, the Tyzen Hsiao Foundation and the Friends of Lee Teng-hui Association, and was joined by delegates from the Taiwan Statebuilding Party and the Taiwan Solidarity
Instead of threatening tariffs on Taiwan-made chips, the US should try to reinforce cooperation with Taiwan on semiconductor development to take on challenges from the People’s Republic of China (PRC), a Taiwanese think tank said. The administration of US President Donald Trump has threatened to impose across-the-board import duties of 32 percent on Taiwan-made goods and levy a separate tariff on semiconductors, which Taiwan is hoping to avoid. The Research Institute for Democracy, Society, and Emerging Technology (DSET), a National Science and Technology Council think tank, said that US efforts should focus on containing China’s semiconductor rise rather than impairing Taiwan. “Without
An SOS message in a bottle has been found in Ireland that is believed to have come from the Taiwanese captain of fishing vessel Yong Yu Sing No. 18 (永裕興18號), who has been missing without a trace for over four years, along with nine Indonesian crew members. The vessel, registered to Suao (蘇澳), went missing near Hawaii on Dec. 30, 2020. The ship has since been recovered, but the 10 crew members have never been found. The captain, surnamed Lee (李), is believed to have signed the note with his name. A post appeared on Reddit on Tuesday after a man
President William Lai (賴清德) today condemned an alleged attempt by two Chinese to snatch a letter of congratulations handed to Taiwan’s taekwondo team after they won silver at the Summer World University Games in Essen, Germany, yesterday. A Chinese man and woman reportedly tried to snatch a congratulatory letter to athletes Hung Jiun-yi (洪俊義), Jung Jiun-jie (鍾俊傑) and Huang Cho-cheng (黃卓乘) from the Ministry of Education, and then argued with media employees. “Why are you taking our things?” the media employees asked. “Does that say Chinese Taipei?” the two Chinese reportedly said. Following the incident, Sports Administration Director-General Cheng Shih-chung (鄭世忠) wrote on
RSS