The KMT's practice of blacklisting dissidents or banning them from entering the country shouldn't be followed by the DPP government, President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) said yesterday.
"An individual shouldn't be banned from entering Taiwan simply because of his or her ideology or opinions," Chen said.
Chen made the remarks while receiving democracy activist Wei Jingsheng (魏京生), one of China's most well known exiled dissidents.
Wei is currently touring Taiwan, giving lectures on democracy.
Chen said that were the DPP government to continue the KMT's government's practice of banning political dissidents, Taiwan would have little right to tout its democratic achievements.
"Our state national security department once offered some names to me to decide whether to ban their entry into Taiwan," Chen told Wei. "I said that if I [approved of the list], then Taiwan would be no different than China."
Chen's comments yesterday were his first on the brouhaha over the Japanese comic book On Taiwan (
Last week the Ministry of the Interior, saying he was a threat to public safety, announced that Kobayashi would be barred from visiting Taiwan because of the controversy his comic book had created.
But the Cabinet quickly ordered the ministry to reconsider its announcement, and a final decision on the matter is still pending.
Many opposition lawmakers and women's groups have severely criticized Kobayashi's book in recent weeks, saying it has hurt Taiwan's dignity.
In the book, Kobayashi quotes Shi Wen-lung (
But some critics, even though they disagreed with the cartoonist's views, said banning Kobayashi wasn't the answer.
Alice King (
But King herself created a new controversy after saying that she doesn't recognize the Republic of China and considers herself as "an adviser to President Chen," not "a national policy adviser of the ROC."
King is a hardline pro-Taiwan independence advocate who was once banned by the KMT from returning to Taiwan.
Both Shi's and King's remarks have led opposition lawmakers to call for Chen to remove them from their posts.
Reversing his low-profile approach toward the controversy over the past week, Chen said yesterday during his meeting with Wei that he held no biases or prejudices when it came to the selection of his senior and national policy advisers.
"The makeup of my policy advisers reflects Taiwan's present political spectrum," Chen said. "My advisers include both pro-independence and pro-unification supporters."
Chen said that he, personally, doesn't fully agree with the views and speeches of some of his advisers.
However, he said, "I have to respect and defend their right to freedom of speech, even though they may express extreme opinions and oppose each other."
Chen said that a broad spectrum of opinions would more accurately reflects the viewpoints of Taiwanese people.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
Taiwan was ranked the fourth-safest country in the world with a score of 82.9, trailing only Andorra, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in Numbeo’s Safety Index by Country report. Taiwan’s score improved by 0.1 points compared with last year’s mid-year report, which had Taiwan fourth with a score of 82.8. However, both scores were lower than in last year’s first review, when Taiwan scored 83.3, and are a long way from when Taiwan was named the second-safest country in the world in 2021, scoring 84.8. Taiwan ranked higher than Singapore in ninth with a score of 77.4 and Japan in 10th with
SECURITY RISK: If there is a conflict between China and Taiwan, ‘there would likely be significant consequences to global economic and security interests,’ it said China remains the top military and cyber threat to the US and continues to make progress on capabilities to seize Taiwan, a report by US intelligence agencies said on Tuesday. The report provides an overview of the “collective insights” of top US intelligence agencies about the security threats to the US posed by foreign nations and criminal organizations. In its Annual Threat Assessment, the agencies divided threats facing the US into two broad categories, “nonstate transnational criminals and terrorists” and “major state actors,” with China, Russia, Iran and North Korea named. Of those countries, “China presents the most comprehensive and robust military threat
RSS