The Taiwan High Court yesterday overturned a Taipei District Court ruling which found two Sunflower movement leaders guilty of violent conduct for clashes with police officers as they tried to enter a public hearing session at the Legislative Yuan on July 31, 2013, on a proposed trade pact with China.
The district court in August last year found academic Tsay Ting-kuei (蔡丁貴) and student Chen Wei-ting (陳為廷) guilty of obstructing an officer in the discharge of their duties.
Tsay was sentenced to 40 days in prison and fined NT$40,000 and Chen was sentenced to 20 days in prison and fined NT$20,000.
In its ruling, the High Court said the proposed cross-strait service trade agreement with China had involved important social and public affairs issues, and at the time, Tsay and Chen did not engage in excessive, violent means, nor did they obstruct police officers from carrying out their duties.
Yesterday’s ruling cannot be appealed.
The Sunflower movement refers to massive protests, largely by university students, that began in front of the Legislative Yuan in Taipei on March 18, 2014, in which they voiced anger over the speed in which then-president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators were trying to get the legislature to review the proposed trade pact.
The protesters stormed the legislature and occupied its main chamber.
The occupation lasted until April 10, several days after then-legislative speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) agreed that the trade agreement would not be reviewed before an oversight act was passed.
Despite political and public opposition, Ma signed the trade pact in June 2013, but it remained unratified by the legislature, which commenced a series of public hearing sessions and legislative committee meetings.
On July 31, 2013, Tsay and Chen led hundreds of students and other protesters as they tried to enter the legislature to take part in the “public” sessions, but they were met by police, who blocked them from entering the hearing.
Physical confrontations ensued, with protesters pushing and shoving against the police cordon.
The KMT legislative caucus said the session was only for legislators and invited experts and observers, and the internal rules did not permit “uninvited persons” to enter the hearing.
Tsay and Chen said they had invitations from Democratic Progressive Party legislators.
During his trial, Chen said the KMT was trying to ram through the trade pact.
“We wanted to join the hearing to express our viewpoints,” he said. “It was our right as citizens to do so, and to get to know what was going on.”
After learning of the High Court’s ruling, Tsay said: “Now I have one less judicial case against me, which is good news for my wife. My struggle against the government over the long run has brought much pressure to my family, and I feel bad for my wife and my family.”
Taiwan’s Lee Chia-hao (李佳豪) on Sunday won a silver medal at the All England Open Badminton Championships in Birmingham, England, a career best. Lee, 25, took silver in the final of the men’s singles against world No. 1 Shi Yuqi (石宇奇) of China, who won 21-17, 21-19 in a tough match that lasted 51 minutes. After the match, the Taiwanese player, who ranks No. 22 in the world, said it felt unreal to be challenging an opponent of Shi’s caliber. “I had to be in peak form, and constantly switch my rhythm and tactics in order to score points effectively,” he said. Lee got
EMBRACING TAIWAN: US lawmakers have introduced an act aiming to replace the use of ‘Chinese Taipei’ with ‘Taiwan’ across all Washington’s federal agencies A group of US House of Representatives lawmakers has introduced legislation to replace the term “Chinese Taipei” with “Taiwan” across all federal agencies. US Representative Byron Donalds announced the introduction of the “America supports Taiwan act,” which would mandate federal agencies adopt “Taiwan” in place of “Chinese Taipei,” a news release on his page on the US House of Representatives’ Web site said. US representatives Mike Collins, Barry Moore and Tom Tiffany are cosponsors of the legislation, US political newspaper The Hill reported yesterday. “The legislation is a push to normalize the position of Taiwan as an autonomous country, although the official US
CHANGE OF TONE: G7 foreign ministers dropped past reassurances that there is no change in the position of the G7 members on Taiwan, including ‘one China’ policies G7 foreign ministers on Friday took a tough stance on China, stepping up their language on Taiwan and omitting some conciliatory references from past statements, including to “one China” policies. A statement by ministers meeting in Canada mirrored last month’s Japan-US statement in condemning “coercion” toward Taiwan. Compared with a G7 foreign ministers’ statement in November last year, the statement added members’ concerns over China’s nuclear buildup, although it omitted references to their concerns about Beijing’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Also missing were references stressing the desire for “constructive and stable relations with China” and
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday said it has lodged a protest with Pretoria after the name of the Taipei Liaison Office in South Africa was changed to the “Taipei Commercial Office” on the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation’s (DIRCO) Web site. In October last year, the South African government asked Taiwan to relocate the Taipei Liaison Office, the nation’s de facto embassy, out of Pretoria. It later agreed to continue negotiating through official channels, but in January asked that the office be relocated by the end of this month. As of the middle of last month, DIRCO’s Web
RSS