A statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) in Taipei’s Yangmingshan National Park (陽明山國家公園) was yesterday found decapitated.
The statue in Yang-ming Park was beheaded and had red paint smeared over it with a message saying: “228 mastermind” and “serial killer.”
A pro-independence group called the Taiwan Nation Founding Engineering Team (台灣建國工程隊) claimed responsibility for the incident.
Photo provided the Taiwan Nation Founding Engineering Team
“Chiang Kai-shek was the mastermind of the 228 Massacre. It is a universally accepted fact that he was one of the ‘big four murderers’ in history,” the group said in a statement.
“Allowing statues of murderer Chiang to be erected and worshiped in Taiwan is a disgrace,” it added.
The move was to “appease the ghost” of Japanese engineer Yoichi Hatta — known among Taiwanese as the “Father of the Chianan Irrigation System,” the group said, in reference to the beheading of a Hatta statue near Tainan’s Wushantou Reservoir (烏山頭水庫) on Sunday.
“Cut down one of ours and we will cut down countless of yours,” the group said.
Center director Sung Fu-hua (宋馥華) said the Taipei Police Department’s Beitou Precinct is investigating the matter.
The owner of the Yang-ming Park shop reported the defaced statue at about 8am yesterday to the Floriculture Experiment Center, which manages the park, Sung said.
“People throw paint at the Chiang statue in front of the floral park every year on Feb. 28,” she said.
The center had hired guards to protect the statue at night, but only recently ended the practice, she said.
The center said it covered the statue so visitors would not be disturbed.
“The head has yet to be found,” Sung said.
Sung said that vandalizing public property is an indictable crime, urging people not to flout the law with similar offenses.
Additional reporting by Huang Chien-hau
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