Taiwanese entertainer Tsai Yi-chen (蔡頤榛) on Thursday apologized for defacing a Japanese national treasure at a temple in Nara in April.
Japanese media on Aug. 23 reported that a 39-year-old Taiwanese woman was arrested on arrival at Japan’s Kansai International Airport on suspicion of splashing an oil-like substance on the Buddha’s Footprint Stone at Yakushiji Temple when she visited it in April.
Prior to the post on Thursday, her manager in a statement had stopped short of confirming whether Tsai, who goes by the stage name Wu-hsiung (五熊), was being investigated by Japanese authorities.
Photo: Screen grab from Yomiuri TV’s YouTube channel
Japan’s Yomiuri TV had broadcast images of Tsai from her social media accounts in its reports on the incident.
“For my ignorance and actions in this incident, which offended Yakushiji Temple and caused distress and harm to people in Japan, I would like to offer my sincerest apologies to everyone in Japan, as well as everyone at Yakushiji Temple who was affected,” Tsai wrote on Thursday.
“I am deeply sorry,” she added.
“I also want to apologize to the people of Taiwan,” she wrote. “I am very sorry for setting such a poor example, and for the controversy and concern my actions have caused.”
NHK reported that prosecutors said Tsai was indicted on Wednesday, with the Nara Summary Court fining her ￥500,000 (US$3,197).
Tsai wrote in her post that she had completed investigation procedures in Japan and was released on Wednesday.
Tsai said she had poured the liquid as a form of prayer.
She said that while cooperating with Japanese authorities and explaining the circumstances truthfully during the investigation, she came to understand that regardless of her intentions or motives, she should have made a greater effort to learn about the culture, history and laws of other countries, particularly cultural properties of significant historical and cultural value.
“I have no excuse for my ignorance and lack of understanding,” she wrote. “I will continue to offer my sincere apologies to Yakushiji Temple and express my remorse for what I did.”
A Taiwanese influencer known as Cheap compared Tsai’s case with a 2023 case in which a Spanish national damaged a temple in Taipei.
In 2023, the Spanish national visited Cixian Temple (慈諴宮) — which Taipei has designated as a historic site — in Shilin District (士林), Cheap wrote on Facebook.
The man applied toluene and mineral spirits on the temple doors, and scrubbed them, causing the painted decorations to dissolve and peel off, the influencer wrote.
Cixian temple estimated that repairs would cost NT$50 million (US$1.58 million), he wrote.
The work was painted in 1960 by Chen Yu-feng (陳玉峰), making restoration particularly difficult, Cheap wrote, adding that the Spanish man was fined just NT$15,000.
The Buddha’s Footprint Stone has been completely restored, while Tsai was fined the equivalent of about NT$100,000, but damage that cannot be repaired in Taiwan carried a penalty of just NT$15,000, he wrote.
“No wonder so many historic sites in Taiwan are destroyed by fire or vandalized,” he added.
Prosecutors in the Cixian Temple case declined to charge the Spaniard over contraventions of the Cultural Heritage Preservation Act (文化資產保存法) — which stipulates six months to five years’ imprisonment and a fine of NT$500,000 to NT$20 million for intentionally damaging a monument — due to insufficient evidence that he knew the temple was a protected historic site.
He was instead prosecuted for ordinary property damage.
Additional reporting by Lin Hsin-ying
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