President Chen Shui-bian (
The president made the call after Hong Kong film star Jimmy Wang (
Hsu fled to the US in 1979 during a crackdown on independence advocates in Taiwan, and lived there for 10 years. He now lives in Taiwan.
"Don't pretend that he [Ma] had nothing to do with the political assassinations committed when the KMT was in power," Chen told the KMT. "Don't say anything like he will reinvestigate the cases if he is elected president. He should simply admit that the KMT did all of those things and apologize to the public."
Wang, 63, the most famous Hong Kong martial arts actor before the rise of Bruce Lee (李小龍), has appeared in 50 films, the most well-known of which is One-Armed Swordsman (1969).
The Liberty Times report said that Wang, who had close relations with gangsters, revealed that then director of the KMT's Mainland Affairs Department Bai Wan-hsiung (白萬祥) had contacted him and said he wanted him to "do something for the country."
Wang said that Bai showed him a photograph and an address in the US and he found out that the person in the photograph was Hsu, the report said.
The report said that Wang did not take the job because Bai had not given him a written contract.
Bai died three years ago.
Wang also said in the interview that the KMT had masterminded the 1984 murder of Chinese-American writer Henry Liu (
Liu, who was a vocal critic of the KMT, was shot dead at his home in Daly City, California, in 1984 as he was about to publish a critical biography of president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國).
Liu's wife later filed a suit accusing Taiwan's Military Intelligence Bureau of ordering the assassination.
Taiwanese media reports at the time said that two members of the "patriotic" pro-KMT Bamboo Union gang had killed Liu on the KMT's orders.
In the interview, Wang said that another Bamboo Union member had been asked to assist in Liu's assassination, but decided to withdraw from the operation.
Wang said that the gangster telephoned him to ask for advice and he told him not to take part in the assassination.
Chen said it was not difficult to see who was behind the murders of Chen Wen-cheng (陳文成) and members of Lin I-hsiung's (林義雄) family.
Carnegie Mellon University professor Chen Wen-cheng was found dead in the grounds of National Taiwan University a day after being questioned by secret police in 1981. The then-KMT government said he had committed suicide.
Lin's six-year-old twin daughters and their grandmother were murdered on Feb. 28, 1980, while Lin was in jail for participating in pro-democracy demonstrations in Kaohsiung in December 1979.
Lin has said he believed the attack had been politically motivated.
Chen said he had tried to discover the truth about the political murders committed under the KMT administration when he was a legislator, but to no avail.
"I'm very curious to know why all the files concerning politically sensitive cases have disappeared," Chen said. "Many of them were connected with the KMT. We don't know exactly what happened, but the KMT certainly does."
DPP vice presidential candidate Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) said yesterday that he was not surprised by the reports of the alleged assassination attempt, because the KMT had committed many political assassinations when it was in power.
KMT spokesman Su Jun-pin (
Su said the accusation was part of a "simplified" history in which "the DPP was clean and excellent while the KMT united with gangsters."
"I am also interested in finding out the truth, but if the story is used as a tool of political wrangling while we are unable to verify its veracity or ask the people concerned to confirm it, it will be unfair to those who are mentioned in the story," Su said.
"This might be something the KMT needs to review during Taiwan's democratic development," Su said.
"Although the DPP has been in office for seven years, it has not done much [in carrying out transitional justice] ... Whenever an election is approaching, it simply exploits these historical tragedies. This, however, is not helpful for us to make a self-examination out of history and make progress," he said.
When approached for comment during a visit to Taitung, Ma said he doubted whether Wang's accusation was true and it would be impossible to verify the story now that Bai had passed away.
Ma said that he and Bai had been acquainted, but he never heard him say anything about the alleged assassination bid.
Ma said he would support an investigation into the story.
"If President Chen is unwilling to do it, I will," he said.
Su said the DPP was exploiting Wang's accusation as a campaign ploy.
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