A Hong Kong activist in exile in the US said a court ruling in Hong Kong to imprison her father for eight months has only made her more determined to fight for the territory and its people.
“I think obviously the [Hong Kong] government wants to use guilt, wants to use a lot of emotions to weight me down, but I’ve found my way to really find my calling in activism for Hong Kong,” said Anna Kwok (郭鳳儀), who is wanted in Hong Kong for her pro-democracy activism.
“So I’m not going to back down. I’m just going to be more strategic with more long-term thinking and be more dedicated to the Hong Kong cause,” she said.
Photo: AP
A Hong Kong court jailed her 69-year-old father, Kwok Yin-sang (郭賢生), for attempting to withdraw about US$11,000 from her insurance policy.
Her father bought the policy when she was a toddler, and she gained control of it when she reached the age of 18. Last year, he sought to terminate the policy and withdraw the money, the court heard. He was arrested and accused of trying to deal with funds belonging to an “absconder.”
Anna Kwok called the sentence “ridiculous” and said it brought home the personal costs of her activism.
“I did go through this journey of finding out what activism means to me, now with this added layer of... very real personal cost that is not faced by me, but faced by my family,” she said.
Kwok said she is no longer able to speak with her family and friends in Hong Kong, adding that she decided to do an on-camera interview to “show my family and people who care about me that I cannot really communicate with that I’m doing okay, please don’t worry too much about me.”
She added that she would not let the Hong Kong government succeed in burdening her with the guilt of putting her family at risk.
South Korea has adjusted its electronic arrival card system to no longer list Taiwan as a part of China, a move that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said would help facilitate exchanges between the two sides. South Korea previously listed “Taiwan” as “Taiwan (China)” in the drop-down menus of its online arrival card system, where people had to fill out where they came from and their next destination. The ministry had requested South Korea make a revision and said it would change South Korea’s name on Taiwan’s online immigration system from “Republic of Korea” to “Korea (South),” should the issue not be
Tainan, Taipei and New Taipei City recorded the highest fines nationwide for illegal accommodations in the first quarter of this year, with fines issued in the three cities each exceeding NT$7 million (US$220,639), Tourism Administration data showed. Among them, Taipei had the highest number of illegal short-term rental units, with 410. There were 3,280 legally registered hotels nationwide in the first quarter, down by 14 properties, or 0.43 percent, from a year earlier, likely indicating operators exiting the market, the agency said. However, the number of unregistered properties rose to 1,174, including 314 illegal hotels and 860 illegal short-term rental
Both sides of the Taiwan Strait share a political foundation based on the “1992 consensus” and opposition to Taiwanese independence, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) today said during her meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Both sides of the Strait should plan and build institutionalized and sustainable mechanisms for dialogue and cooperation based on that foundation to make peaceful development across the Strait irreversible, she said. Peace is a shared moral value across the Strait, and both sides should move beyond political confrontation to seek institutionalized solutions to prevent war, she said. Mutually beneficial cross-strait relations are what the
ECONOMIC COERCION: Such actions are often inconsistently applied, sometimes resumed, and sometimes just halted, the Presidential Office spokeswoman said The government backs healthy and orderly cross-strait exchanges, but such arrangements should not be made with political conditions attached and never be used as leverage for political maneuvering or partisan agendas, Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said yesterday. Kuo made the remarks after China earlier in the day announced 10 new “incentive measures” for Taiwan, following a landmark meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) in Beijing on Friday. The measures, unveiled by China’s Xinhua news agency, include plans to resume individual travel by residents of Shanghai and China’s Fujian
RSS