On the eve of the 54th anniversary of the 288 Incident, President Chen Shui-bian (
Chen urged the government to make the histories of the incident and records from the "White Terror" era (
"We should restore the real face of Taiwan's history, and bring about a just and fair society by way of researching these historical documents," Chen said yesterday while visiting Academia Historica.
PHOTO: CHEN CHENG-CHANG, TAIPEI TIMES
The government will today open a 10-day exhibition that will make public long-sealed documents from the 228 Incident archive.
"The 228 Incident is a very important event in Taiwan's post World War II history, and many historians have appealed to the government to release them," Chen said.
"The exhibition will make public parts of documents taken from more than 50,000 documents, which were collected from more than 40 institutes during the past half year," Chen said.
The 228 Incident was a brutal military crackdown on civilian protests that broke out on Feb. 28, 1947 against the KMT administration on Taiwan. The actual number of people killed and missing remains unknown, but some have placed the figure in the tens of thousands.
During the White Terror period from 1949 -- when the KMT forces lost the Chinese Civil War to the Communists -- to 1987, when martial law was lifted, thousands of Taiwan's most prominent citizens and leading intellectuals were dragged from their homes to be killed or vanish without explanation as the KMT waged war against Taiwan's Japanese-educated intelligentsia.
The president said he had also found many other important archives in Academia Historica's confidential storeroom, "Such as the archives of presidents Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) and Chiang Ching-kuo's (蔣經國), and even some about the history of Formosa Magazine," Chen said.
Members of the magazine advocated democratic reform and were arrested by the government for being involved in the Kaohsiung Incident of 1979.
"These precious documents record the real face of Taiwan's recent history and they should be made public because they belong to all of the country's people," the president added.
Chen stressed that the government must compile these documents and prevent them from being illegally destroyed.
"Academia Historica should immediately set up a complete archive to preserve these documents about the White Terror era and the Kaohsiung Incident, which will help historians learn about the real face of that age," Chen said.
One of Chen's campaign promises was to investigate some of the major events surrounding human rights issues and the democratic movement that occurred during previous KMT administrations, and make them public.
The Executive Yuan's Research, Development and Evaluation Commission was charged with implementing Chen's promise after his inauguration last May.
"The exhibition of 228 Incident archives is just the first step," said Lin Chia-cheng (
‘NO SECURITY RISK’: The Railway Bureau reassured the public that the technicians’ activities were limited to technical guidance and did not involve sensitive systems The Railway Bureau yesterday said it had invited eight Chinese technicians to assist with an airport MRT construction project. The bureau issued the confirmation after an Internet user said Chinese nationals had entered the construction zone of Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport’s Terminal 3 project. They asked why “individuals from an enemy state” were allowed access to such a major national infrastructure project, which raised serious concerns over Taiwan’s industrial safety, sensitive systems and information security. The bureau’s Northern Region Engineering Branch Office said subcontractor Taiwan Handle Industrial Co (台灣手把工業) of the Taoyuan airport MRT’s “Contract No. CU05 Project A14 Station Civil, MEP &
The National Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology yesterday showcased its locally developed variants of the Vision 60 robotic patrol dog, which it plans to deploy on the nation’s outlying territories in the South China Sea. The variants were produced under the Joint Lab project — created by the institute and domestic companies — and assembled with domestically produced motors, lenses and artificial intelligence (AI) systems alongside licensed tech from the US, Missile and Rocket Systems Research Division deputy director Jen Kuo-kang (任國光) told the media event at a military base in Taipei’s Dazhi (大直) area. Taiwan has built up its strengths
NOT IMMEDIATE: Taiwan has a chance to appeal the proposed 10 percent tariff before it starts, while other countries face a 12.5 percent tariff from the trade office Taiwan is among 60 economies determined by the US to have failed to impose or enforce a ban on the importation of goods produced with forced labor, according to a notice released on Tuesday by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), which proposed imposing an additional 10 percent or more tariff on them. The USTR in a statement said that following an investigation, it had determined under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 that the failure of the 60 economies to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labor is
TIT-FOR-TAT: The US allegedly revoked the visa of a Chinese national working at Xinhua News Agency in the US in response to Beijing’s expulsion of Vivian Wang The Presidential Office yesterday condemned China for expelling a New York Times correspondent from Beijing following the newspaper’s interview with President William Lai (賴清德), saying the move highlighted Beijing’s suppression of press freedom and its threat to international news media. Taiwan has noted a series of recent incidents in which Beijing used similar tactics to “threaten and pressure international media outlets and journalists,” Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said in a statement. “This concerns not only press freedom and freedom of expression, but also the safety of journalists, and Taiwan and relevant partners are paying close attention to the situation,” she
RSS