A National Human Rights Museum exhibition featuring 10 undelivered letters composed by people just before their executions during the White Terror era opened at National Taitung University on Monday.
In the White Terror era, many death-row inmates awaiting execution for charges of political offenses wrote letters to their families and gave them to prison guards in the vain hope that they would be delivered, exhibition organizers said.
Instead, the authorities collected the unsent letters and deposited them in a classified government archive. By the time of declassification, some of the letters had been sealed for more than 60 years, organizers said.
Photo: Huang Ming-tang, Taipei Times
In 2011, the museum completed cataloging the archive, counting letters from 112 prisoners who were executed.
After ensuring surviving family members would receive the letters, the museum chose 10 documents from the archive to use in an exhibition to commemorate White Terror history.
The letters contained final personal messages to loved ones.
Many husbands told their wives they should remarry.
Kuo Ching (郭慶) said in his final message to his wife: “If possible, I would like you to remarry.”
Chen Chen-chi’s (陳振奇) letter read: “I have followed father to heaven. A-feng (阿蜂), it would be best for you to remarry.”
Another husband, Wang Yao-hsun (王耀勳), wrote: “Please wait until our daughter is six years old before remarrying.”
Tsai Tieh-cheng (蔡鐵城) addressed his letter to his sister, saying: “I am so sorry. I failed you in my mission as your brother.”
Chou Wei (周威), a civics instructor at National Taitung Girls’ Senior High School and his class of 30 students were among the visitors to the exhibition on its first day, and the letters moved many of them to tears.
“The exhibition’s historical material is useful to help students deepen their understanding of the White Terror era,” Chou said.
“It helps them to see the harm to human rights that the state apparatus can inflict when it operates without regard for procedural justice,” Chou added.
The exhibition, which was jointly organized with the university, runs through Thursday next week.
A study published by online booking platform Expedia revealed searches for travel to Taipei have ballooned 2,786 percent following the lifting of COVID-19 pandemic travel restrictions due to the city being a “designation dupe” for Seoul. The TikTok trend for duping — referring to substituting a designation for a more inexpensive alternative — helped propel interest in Taipei, it said in a consumer survey titled “Unpack ‘24,” which was conducted from September to October in 14 countries. Location dupes are “every bit as delightful as the tried-and-true places travelers love,” Expedia trend tracker Melanie Fish said of the year’s popular alternatives, which
SAFETY IN REGULATION: The proposal states that Chiayi should assess whether it is viable to establish such a district and draft rules to protect clients and sex workers The Chiayi City Council passed a motion yesterday to assess the viability of establishing a regulated red-light district. The council yesterday held its last session of the year, at which its fiscal 2024 budget was approved, along with 61 other proposals. The proposal to assess the viability of establishing a red-light district was put forward by independent Chiayi City Councilor Molly Yen (顏色不分藍綠支持性專區顏色田慎節). The proposal cited 2011 amendments to the Social Order Maintenance Act (社會秩序維護法), which stipulate that city and county governments can pass autonomous regulations on the sex trade to manage the industry and guarantee industry workers’ rights. A ban on the
A small-scale protest that called on the government to cancel its plan to welcome Indian migrant workers in a bid to tackle Taiwan’s labor shortage was held in Taipei yesterday. During the protest, comprised of a few dozen people staged in front of the Presidential Office on Ketagalan Boulevard, the protest’s chief initiator, a woman identified only as “Yuna” said they wanted the central government to reconsider allowing migrant workers from India to enter Taiwan. Most people in Taiwan had little knowledge about the potential plan to allow in Indian migrant workers until a report in the media last month, she
STABILITY AND CHANGE: Flagging in recent polls, Ko this week pledged to maintain President Tsai’s foreign policy, with an emphasis on improving China relations Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman and presidential candidate Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) yesterday reiterated that he is “deep-green at heart” in response to accusations that he is pivoting his campaign to align closer with the ideology of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in the face of flagging polls. Ko made the remark at an agricultural policy conference in Taipei, repeating his comments from an interview with CTS News a day earlier. Ko told the CTS host that he would continue to pursue President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) national defense and foreign policy in general, but with an emphasis on establishing a rapport with
RSS