Representatives from several groups yesterday gathered in front of the main gate of Taipei’s Liberty Square to mark the 30th anniversary of the beginning of the Wild Lily student movement.
Organizers from the groups, including the National Students’ Union of Taiwan (NSUT), the Taiwan Youth Association for Democracy, the Taiwan Citizen Front and the Economic Democracy Union, carried a banner that read: “Fellow citizens, how can we tolerate the oppression of 700 emperors again?”
The banner is a replica of one held by student demonstrators from National Taiwan University in 1990, NSUT president Tan Ko-him (陳佑維) said.
Photo: Chien Jung-fong, Taipei Times
“Although at the time martial law had already been lifted in Taiwan, an atmosphere of ‘unfreedom’ still permeated the air,” he said.
The movement’s participants “became a force that pushed the island forward,” he said.
“Today, 30 years later, we mention the Wild Lily [movement] again not just to commemorate history,” he said.
“After breaking free from the oppression of 700 emperors, reform is not yet complete,” the groups said in a statement, which the members read aloud.
They also listed several demands for the lawmakers elected on Jan. 11.
These included a call for the Democratic Progressive Party not to use its legislative majority to “block the discussion of diverse opinions.”
Other parties, on the other hand, should “pursue real changes to the content of bills,” the groups said.
They also demanded a reform of the Legislative Yuan’s electoral system.
The current system “overly protects” the two major political parties, and is “not conducive to the establishment of a pluralistic democratic system,” they said.
Chou Ko-jen (周克任), one of the participants in the Wild Lily movement, said that the atmosphere at Liberty Square today was different from 1990.
“Back then, as soon as we came to this place and reporters arrived, riot police began to prepare,” he said.
Many issues remain unresolved, he said, adding that motivating civil servants at the local level to enforce the law is crucial to Taiwan’s competitiveness.
GREAT POWER COMPETITION: Beijing views its military cooperation with Russia as a means to push back against the joint power of the US and its allies, an expert said A recent Sino-Russian joint air patrol conducted over the waters off Alaska was designed to counter the US military in the Pacific and demonstrated improved interoperability between Beijing’s and Moscow’s forces, a national security expert said. National Defense University associate professor Chen Yu-chen (陳育正) made the comment in an article published on Wednesday on the Web site of the Journal of the Chinese Communist Studies Institute. China and Russia sent four strategic bombers to patrol the waters of the northern Pacific and Bering Strait near Alaska in late June, one month after the two nations sent a combined flotilla of four warships
THE TOUR: Pope Francis has gone on a 12-day visit to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore. He was also invited to Taiwan The government yesterday welcomed Pope Francis to the Asia-Pacific region and said it would continue extending an invitation for him to visit Taiwan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs made the remarks as Pope Francis began a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific on Monday. He is to travel about 33,000km by air to visit Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore, and would arrive back in Rome on Friday next week. It would be the longest and most challenging trip of Francis’ 11-year papacy. The 87-year-old has had health issues over the past few years and now uses a wheelchair. The ministry said
TAIWANESE INNOVATION: The ‘Seawool’ fabric generates about NT$200m a year, with the bulk of it sourced by clothing brands operating in Europe and the US Growing up on Taiwan’s west coast where mollusk farming is popular, Eddie Wang saw discarded oyster shells transformed from waste to function — a memory that inspired him to create a unique and environmentally friendly fabric called “Seawool.” Wang remembered that residents of his seaside hometown of Yunlin County used discarded oyster shells that littered the streets during the harvest as insulation for their homes. “They burned the shells and painted the residue on the walls. The houses then became warm in the winter and cool in the summer,” the 42-year-old said at his factory in Tainan. “So I was
‘LEADERS’: The report highlighted C.C. Wei’s management at TSMC, Lisa Su’s decisionmaking at AMD and the ‘rock star’ status of Nvidia’s Huang Time magazine on Thursday announced its list of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence (AI), which included Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家), Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) and AMD chair and CEO Lisa Su (蘇姿丰). The list is divided into four categories: Leaders, Innovators, Shapers and Thinkers. Wei and Huang were named in the Leaders category. Other notable figures in the Leaders category included Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Meta CEO and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Su was listed in the Innovators category. Time highlighted Wei’s
RSS