Retired army major general Yu Pei-chen (于北辰) on Saturday said he is not afraid of death threats he has received for his criticism of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Yu, who was a commander of the army’s 542nd Armor Brigade and retired in 2015, on Friday said he reported a death threat he received by e-mail to police.
“I will ensure death for your family one by one, and this is no joke,” Yu quoted the e-mail as saying.
Photo: Chou Min-hung, Taipei Times
Police said an initial investigation indicated the IP address of the sender was in Germany.
Yu on Saturday said he would not move his family, adding that “whoever wrote the e-mail can confront me personally, but do not harm my family.”
He said he has been critical of the CCP and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, and he suspects that the writer of the e-mail is “a supporter of China’s regime, or an underground Chinese operative working in Taiwan.”
“I have no fear, as I have done nothing wrong,” he added.
Yu is a member of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT). After his retirement, he was appointed head of the Taoyuan chapter of the party’s Huang Fu-hsing (黃復興) military veterans’ branch and deputy director of the KMT’s Taoyuan chapter. He was removed from the posts last year.
He has since been a political commentator on television talk shows, where he has criticized the CCP and its military threats to annex Taiwan.
He has drawn criticism from some KMT members for his views.
Yu said he joined the military at age 15 and served during the 1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis.
“In those times, soldiers were taught communist China is the enemy of the Republic of China,” he said. “But now I see some of my former military superiors travel to China to play golf and go on junkets to wine and dine at banquets.”
“Recently, we have heard these commanders say that ‘airspace does not belong to us’ and that ‘Chinese incursions should not be considered harassment of Taiwan.’ Such talk is hard to stomach for our fellow soldiers,” he said.
Retired generals who trumpet the Chinese government line or receive financial backing from Beijing should quit the KMT, he added.
Additional reporting by Jason Pan
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