Clashes broke out between Tibet support groups and Grand Hotel staff in the lobby yesterday after the management canceled a room reservation made by the groups in preparation for the arrival of a delegation headed by Sichuan Province Governor Jiang Jufeng (蔣巨峰).
“We have signed a [room rental] contract with you and it was clearly written on the contract that the room would be used to hold a press conference. How can you cancel our reservation at the last minute? Is this how the Grand Hotel honors its business contracts?” Taiwan Friends of Tibet (TFOT) president Chow Mei-li (周美里) asked Grand Hotel manager Michael Chen (陳行中) after being informed of the cancelation.
TFOT’s press conference was to be held 30 minutes before the news conference by Jiang.
Photo: Loa Iok-sin, Taipei Times
PURPOSE
Chen said the reservation was canceled because the group rented the room “for certain purposes” that could “have an impact” on the hotel.
“Of course we came here for a purpose, who would reserve a hotel room without a purpose?” Chow said. “It’s written clearly on the contract that our purpose is to hold a press conference here.”
TFOT was to hold a press conference on the second floor of the hotel, as a symposium on business investment and tourism in Sichuan Province was to take place simultaneously on the 12th floor.
More serious verbal and physical conflict broke out when Tibetans accompanying Chow grew impatient and took out banners and Tibetan flags that were to be used to decorate the news conference venue. They shouted slogans calling on Jiang to release the more than 300 monks arrested from Kirti Monastery in the predominantly Tibetan area of Ngaba in Sichuan Province and to withdraw troops and police that had placed the monastery under siege.
The manager and other members of the hotel management tried to take the signs and banners from the Tibetans by force.
The two sides pushed and shoved, while hotel management and staffers chased Tibetans running around the lobby with Tibetan flags in hand.
Political commentator Paul Lin (林保華), head of the Taiwan Youth Anti-Communist Corps who had been invited to talk at the press conference, fainted after his blood pressure spiked.
POLICE INTERVENTION
The conflict ended when police arrived at the scene to break up the fight and helped negotiate terms for another room for TFOT and other supporting groups.
In the delayed news conference, Lin said that Jiang had served as Sichuan governor since 2007 and “should be held responsible for the arrests and bloody crackdowns of Tibetans in the province, as well as corruption and scandals related to the handling of donations” for the massive earthquake that devastated the province in May 2008.
Victims of Investment in China Association president William Kao (高為邦) warned entrepreneurs thinking of investing in Sichuan that it was not only one of the provinces in China with the worst human rights records, but also one with numerous cases of officials cheating Taiwanese investors.
CRACKDOWN
Toward the end of the conference, a video showing images of Tibetans who died during bloody crackdowns by Chinese security officials was shown.
In tears after watching the video, Chow urged the public to express their concern over human rights abuses in Sichuan in whichever way possible.
“You don’t have to be a Buddhist, a Tibetan, or Taiwanese,” Chow said. “You can be anyone, but as a person, you should give your full support to the Tibetans suffering there.”
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Friday condemned Chinese and Russian authorities for escalating regional tensions, citing Chinese warplanes crossing the Taiwan Strait’s median line and joint China-Russia military activities breaching South Korea’s air defense identification zone (KADIZ) over the past two days. A total of 30 Chinese warplanes crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait on Thursday and Friday, entering Taiwan’s northern and southwestern airspace in coordination with 15 naval vessels and three high-altitude balloons, the MAC said in a statement. The Chinese military also carried out another “joint combat readiness patrol” targeting Taiwan on Thursday evening, the MAC said. On
INTIMIDATION: In addition to the likely military drills near Taiwan, China has also been waging a disinformation campaign to sow division between Taiwan and the US Beijing is poised to encircle Taiwan proper in military exercise “Joint Sword-2024C,” starting today or tomorrow, as President William Lai (賴清德) returns from his visit to diplomatic allies in the Pacific, a national security official said yesterday. Commenting on condition of anonymity, the official said that multiple intelligence sources showed that China is “highly likely” to launch new drills around Taiwan. Although the drills’ scale is unknown, there is little doubt that they are part of the military activities China initiated before Lai’s departure, they said. Beijing at the same time is conducting information warfare by fanning skepticism of the US and
NO RIGHT: After 38 years of martial law under the former KMT government, the KMT is the least qualified to accuse others of harboring such intentions, DPP officials said The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday accused the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) of creating a stir on social media by implying that the government supports martial law, adding that the KMT is the least qualified to criticize others after decades of martial law in Taiwan under the former KMT regime. After South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol late on Tuesday night declared martial law (which was rescinded six hours later), the DPP caucus issued a statement on Thread saying that Taiwan’s legislature was facing a situation similar to that in South Korea, which had prompted Yoon to declare martial law. “The South
‘FACT-BASED’: There is no ban, and 2 million Taiwanese have traveled to China this year, which is more than the 285,000 Chinese who visited Taiwan, the council said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday accused China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) of shifting the blame for Beijing’s tourism ban on Taiwan, continuing a war of words that started in the past week. The council’s remark came hours after its Chinese counterpart on Friday accused the government of creating barriers to the resumption of reciprocal group tours across the Taiwan Strait. The TAO accused the MAC of releasing untruthful information and dragging its feet on the tourism sector’s call to establishing ferries linking Pingtung County to China’s Pingtan Island. The MAC failed to respond to overtures to restore direct flights and raised the
RSS