Chen Shui-bian fasts in detention protest
　

ACTION: It was not clear if the former president intends to go on a hunger strike, but his lawyer said he had not eaten since being detained, and has only taken water
　

By Ko Shu-ling
STAFF REPORTER
Friday, Nov 14, 2008, Page 1
　

Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) has stopped eating to protest against what he called the “death of the judiciary,” his lawyer Cheng Wen-long (鄭文龍) said yesterday.

In a statement issued by Chen’s office, Cheng said his client had not eaten since he was detained on Wednesday morning in connection with corruption allegations, although he was drinking water.

Cheng did not use the term “hunger strike” in describing Chen’s action, and at press time it was not clear if Chen’s fast was intended to be a hunger strike.

Cheng said he had visited Chen at the Taipei Detention Center yesterday morning.

Officials at the center said they would keep a close eye on Chen’s condition, the lawyer said.

Chen is suspected of embezzling about NT$15 million (US$450,000) during his two terms in office. He is also suspected of money laundering, taking bribes and forgery.

The court’s decision to detain him capped a six-month investigation into the graft allegations against the former president. Chen has denied any wrongdoing.
　

His detention came five days after Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) ended a controversial visit to Taipei.

Chen has criticized the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) administration for “political persecution” and waging a “political vendetta” against him to curry favor with Beijing.

Cheng said he tried to talk Chen into eating something during their meeting yesterday, but Chen refused and asked him to make public the 10 reasons why he stopped eating.

From reasons were: The judiciary is dead; democracy has regressed; he is willing to go to jail for the Taiwanese; he is willing to sacrifice his life for a Republic of Taiwan; he is opposed to authoritarianism, communism and dictatorship; he wants sovereignty, freedom and democracy for Taiwan; Taiwan must be protected from China’ bullying; Taiwan and China are “one state on each side of the Taiwan Strait”; Taiwanese must rise and make an all-out effort for the cause; and persistence will prevail.

Cheng said Chen wanted him to relay his appreciation to those who cared about him, especially the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which has issued a five-point statement, and DPP Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文).

Tsai has called Chen’s detention “shoddily administered and an abuse of power.”

She also urged authorities to show more respect for the rights of a former president and not to incite people and cause division.

Chen also thanked former vice president Annette Lu (呂秀蓮), DPP legislators, human rights groups and other private institutions for their support.

Meanwhile, Chen’s office said it was helping plan a nighttime event on Nov. 22 in Yuanshan Park to back Chen. The event would be organized by the Ketagalan Institute, which Chen founded.

Chen’s office said it had asked the DPP’s Taipei chapter to apply for police permission for the event and Tsai has promised to offer any necessary assistance.

Executive Yuan Spokeswoman Vanessa Shih (史亞平) refused to comment on Chen’s detention, saying his case had not been discussed at the weekly Cabinet meeting.

“The government’s position on cases under judicial investigation has been ‘no comment and no interference,’” Shih said.

She urged those planning to take to the streets in support of Chen to respect prosecutorial independence, keep faith in the judicial system and remain rational.

Councilors target Yahoo
　

TAIWAN BANNED: The local search engine company made the Chinese characters for Taiwan illegal when applying for e-mail accounts for its popular Web site
　

By Mo Yan-chih
STAFF REPORTER
Friday, Nov 14, 2008, Page 2

Taipei City councilors demanded an apology from Internet portal Yahoo-Kimo Taiwan yesterday for including “Taiwan” in its list of illegal Chinese characters, preventing users from applying for accounts using the word.

Although Yahoo-Kimo immediately removed the ban early yesterday, some Taipei City councilors from the pan-green camp challenged the search engine company over its purpose of banning the word “Taiwan,” and demanded that it offer an apology and a clear explanation as to why it put the ban in place.

“We don’t know if Yahoo-Kimo was cooperating with China in suppressing Taiwan or the company adopted a new set of rules because the new government is pro-China,” Democratic Progressive Party Taipei City Councilor Lee Ching-feng (李慶鋒) said yesterday at the Taipei City Council.

Lee said only Yahoo-Kimo Taiwan and China banned users from applying for accounts with the word “Taiwan.” The term could still be used to apply for an account on Yahoo Hong Kong and Canada during the ban.

When applying for an “ilovetaiwan” e-mail account on Wednesday, the Web site refused the request, saying “the username contains illegal characters,” rather than “the username is being used,” he said.

Lee said Yahoo-Kimo Taiwan removed the ban after a provisional meeting yesterday.

Independent Taipei City Councilor Chen Chien-ming (陳建銘) joined Lee in condemning Yahoo-Kimo Taiwan, and called on the public to write letters to the company protesting against its moves.

Chen and Lee also urged the public to boycott the company if it failed to explain the matter.

In response, a public relations representative from the company told the Taipei Times by telephone yesterday that the company initially restricted user names containing the word “Taiwan” because the local Internet search giant refers to itself as Yahoo, Taiwan. To the company, “Yahoo” and “Taiwan” are two keywords that are intricately linked, the representative said.

Yahoo-Kimo also has a list of keywords not allowed on its e-mail account names such as words related to pornography and brand names, said the representative, who wished not to be identified.

To prevent any misunderstanding, the Internet portal had blocked all e-mail account applications with user names containing Taiwan for fear people might affiliate them with the company.

But because of the overwhelming amount of feedback it received from users, the online auctioneers lifted the ban on Wednesday afternoon, the representative said, adding that the technology has been updated at midnight yesterday.

Wild Strawberries call for probes
　

YOUTH GONE WILD: The demonstrators asked the government which article authorizes the police to stop people from waving Taiwan’s flag, but not China’s flag
　

By Flora Wang
Friday, Nov 14, 2008, Page 4
　

The student demonstrators of the Wild Strawberry Student Movement yesterday urged the government to initiate investigations and explain to the public the alleged use of excessive force by police against protesters during the visit of a top Chinese envoy last week.

In an on-line statement on the students’ Web blog (action1106.blogspot.com) yesterday, the students urged the government to explain to the public specifically which law authorized the police to prevent people from waving Taiwan’s national flag, but allowed people to hold China’s national flag during demonstrations for and against the visit by Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) last week.

The students also urged the government to clarify to the public whether all police officers involved in the security measures last week carried out their duties in accordance with normal administrative procedures and urged the authorities to reflect on whether their measures had been excessive.

The students have been staging silent sit-ins nationwide, protesting what they call excessive police force during Chen’s five-day stay.

They are demanding an apology from President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) and the resignation of National Police Agency Director-General Wang Cho-chun (王卓鈞) and National Security Bureau Director-General Tsai Chao-ming (蔡朝明).

Also on the students’ agenda is an immediate amendment to the Assembly and Parade Law (集會遊行法), which currently obliges event organizers to gain police approval before holding rallies.

On their Web blog, the students have included numerous hyperlinks to video clips showing police security measures last week, including one that showed a plainclothes police officer telling a person videotaping the protest at Zhongshan Bridge to immediately leave “or I will ask a member of the Special Weapons And Tactics [SWAT] team to arrest you.”

“We can see that the law enforcement authorities assigned police officers a mission to complete and that police officers would rather excessively limit or even violate people’s basic human rights in a bid to save their own jobs,” the student protesters’ statement said, adding that the police had violated people’s constitutional rights by resorting to force against those who did not pose an obvious and immediate threat to Chen.

The students also shrugged off Ma’s comments on Wednesday that excessive use of police force had only occurred in isolated cases.

“These illegal and unconstitutional incidents and violations of human rights took place because the government expanded the scale of law enforcement during Chen’s stay in Taiwan,” student movement spokesman Lee Li-wei (李立偉) said.

Meanwhile, Lee called on teachers and students who supported the movement to gather and broaden the scale of the sit-in at Liberty Square, outside the Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall tomorrow.

Lee said about 50 students from Hong Kong Polytechnic University would launch a sit-in at their school in support of the movement today.

Speak now or forever be silent

Friday, Nov 14, 2008, Page 8

“They came first for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist.”

Many are familiar with these words penned by German pastor Martin Niemoeller, who initially supported Adolf Hitler but was later imprisoned by the Nazis during World War II.

Niemoeller’s poem, with its haunting last line — “Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up” — depicted his atonement for not stepping forward sooner and speaking up against the Nazis.

After being lauded by the international community for its progressive achievements on the path toward a mature democracy, little did Taiwan know that it would all come back to this. Many are asking if the nation is about to sink back into the dark age of Martial Law. Will the people remain mute in the face of what has brazenly been taking place in this country these past few months?

From the abrupt detention of Chiayi County Commissioner Chen Ming-wen (陳明文) and Yunlin County Commissioner Su Chih-fen (蘇治芬) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to the shockingly abusive manner the police employed to disperse protesters during the visit of Chinese envoy Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) last week; from police monitoring of Taipei City councilors’ activities to the Taichung County Government checking whether any civil servants had taken any days off during Chen’s visit from Nov. 3 to Nov. 7 — all these have aroused concern at home and abroad that democratic values and human rights have suffered under the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government.

At home, groups of college students across the country have since Thursday last week staged a sit-in to protest against police brutality in dealing with the demonstrators and to urge President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) to apologize over the matter. Abroad, some 20 academics specializing in Taiwan affairs in the US, Canada and Australia last week issued a joint statement expressing their concern over the detentions of opposition politicians being held incommunicado without charges, warning that these “arrests could signal an erosion of Taiwanese democracy.”

All these voices, however, do not appear to be enough as Liu arrogantly declared, in response to the students’ demands, “that kind of thing [the sit-in] will blow over after a couple of days.”

Both Ma and Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) have also insisted time and again that the police had done nothing wrong and there was no need for an apology.

Six months into Ma’s presidency and the public has already witnessed a disillusioned senior citizen setting himself on fire in protest, politicians staging hunger strikes and students holding a sit-in protest.

Continuous pressure is needed to deal with the government’s arrogant display of power.

Some people laugh off talk of a return to White Terror or the Martial Law era. Perhaps they have to wait for the time they are stopped by police on the street, their iPods checked or their blog entries removed before they would remember Niemoeller’s words and wonder what would have happened if they had only spoken up sooner.

Who is calling the shots in Taiwan?
　

By Sushil Seth
Friday, Nov 14, 2008, Page 8

‘So why is the Ma administration in such an unseemly haste to hitch Taiwan’s wagon to a wayward Chinese engine?’

Has the administration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) thought through its headlong embrace of China? The deals to expand relations covering shipping, air transport and postal services might look like progress but the question is: who is calling the shots?

It is certainly not the Ma government. So far, Beijing has not moved an inch in terms of acknowledging Taiwan’s identity. Describing the advance in relations, China’s top negotiator, Chen Yunlin (陳雲林), called it “a crystallization of the joint efforts of many compatriots across the Strait.”

In other words, it is a process of integrating Taiwan into China.

China’s infiltration into Taiwan through such expanded contacts will be a nightmare to monitor and regulate. From the exchanges between the two sides so far, one doesn’t get a sense that the Ma administration is seeking to guard Taiwan’s sovereign identity.

The sense rather is that the Ma administration is acting as a facilitator. And any opposition to this is being harshly handled, sometimes draconian measures have been used against political dissent.

There are even fears that there might be a concerted attempt to undermine democracy in Taiwan to promote Beijing’s agenda.

The Ma government has a mandate to govern but not to diminish or barter away Taiwan’s sovereignty. The will of the people should determine Taiwan’s future.

It is pertinent to remember that most polls have indicated an overwhelming popular desire to maintain Taiwan’s distinct political status.

Now that a series of deals about expanding services have been concluded, the two sides will obviously move on to the political agenda.

Will China enter into a peace treaty? That would seem highly unlikely, suggesting a relationship of sovereign equality between the two sides that is anathema to Beijing.

Will China allow Taipei some space on the international stage in forums like the UN and its agencies? Again, it would seem highly unlikely.

The arguments generally given in favor of greater integration and eventual unification with China are three-fold.

First is the argument of a common and shared culture and language.

By that logic, Australia and New Zealand, which not only share a common language and heritage but also have geographical proximity, should have merged into one country long ago.

In the Middle East, where people in most countries speak Arabic and share a common Islamic heritage, national identities are as important as ever.

And such examples can be multiplied.

Taiwan has a distinct political identity and is a middle-sized nation of more than 20 million people, about as much as Australia and about five times the population of New Zealand.

The second argument favoring Taiwan’s integration is to further peace and harmony across the Taiwan Strait.

This again doesn’t seem terribly smart and convincing. If in the process of buying peace, a country has to surrender its sovereignty, the world would be a very turbulent and unhappy place.

In such a world, very few small countries will be able to maintain their independence and sovereignty when faced with aggression from a powerful neighbor.

The third argument is to expand Taiwan’s economic prosperity by throwing in its lot with China. However, so far, despite all the fanfare of moving in with China, concrete results in terms of economic advantage are not yet apparent.

Besides, Taiwan hasn’t done badly without needing to be submerged into China. It has been one of Asia’s most successful economies.

So why is the Ma administration in such an unseemly haste to hitch Taiwan’s wagon to a wayward Chinese engine?

Is there a sense that Taiwan’s time as an independent political entity has run out? With China so powerful and the US mired in the Middle East, Taiwan might seem so vulnerable that a deal with China seems the only alternative.

That is not necessarily the case. Indeed, if the US interest in Taiwan were to slacken (and don’t bet on it, with president-elect Barack Obama keen on revamping US strategic priorities), Beijing won’t have to fear that Taiwan could be turned into a US base of sorts to threaten China.

Taiwan will hardly be a threat to China.

Taiwan indeed can remain as a successful pilot project for democracy in China at some future time if the latter were to descend into social instability.

A close relationship between China and Taiwan can develop as it has between Australia and New Zealand, with neither fearing the other while partaking of all the benefits of a shared heritage.

The Ma administration needs to be a bit more creative in its dealings with China. It doesn’t need to crawl when all it needs is a steady walk, assuming that it wants to save Taiwan from China.

Sushil Seth is a writer based in Australia.

Support the students’ appeal for democracy
　

By Jason Liu 劉建興
Friday, Nov 14, 2008, Page 8

We thought thE authoritarian regime was long gone. We thought that freedom of speech had become part of our life.We were wrong.

Freedom and democracy — hard to attain, easy to crush. Over the past half a century, many have sacrificed their freedom, their youth, even their dear lives to attain these rights. However, in this past week, we have witnessed the return of the authoritarian regime, with its relentless suppression of freedom of speech and assembly. In order to “welcome” Chen Yun-lin (陳雲林), the special envoy from China, peaceful protesters who were waving national flags or banners, singing or loudly voicing their appeals were brutally “served” by the police with fists, kicks and sticks.

Society was shocked by this regression of democracy and freedom of speech. Civic groups have begun to organize themselves. University students have taken action to defend their freedom of speech.

The sit-in protest by students started in front of the Executive Yuan on Thursday night last week. Three days later, the students formed the “Wild Strawberries Movement.” Democracy is in peril, they say, and critical issues are at stake: The Assembly and Parade Law (集會遊行法) violates the Constitution and human rights have been infringed upon. They have demanded that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Premier Liu Chao-hsuan (劉兆玄) apologize; that National Security Bureau Director Tsai Chao-ming (蔡朝明) and National Police Agency Director-­General Wang Cho-chiun (王卓鈞) step down and that the Assembly and Parade Law be amended.

In support of the students’ cause, civic groups on Tuesday launched a vigil walk around Liberty Square from 6pm to 7pm every evening. The organizers are calling on people from all walks of life to participate in this civic movement to support the “Wild Strawberries” and “safeguard Taiwan.”

As democracy pioneer Chiang Wei-shui (蔣渭水) said: “Our strength has its roots in our solidarity.” To preserve our hard-won achievements in democracy, we must demonstrate the will and strength of civil society, condemn the use of state violence and defend the freedom of speech.

Jason Liu is a professor at the National Taiwan University of Science and Technology.

Focusing on bridging the ethnopolitical divide
　

By Yu-Wen chen 陳玉文
Friday, Nov 14, 2008, Page 8

Taiwan has no shortage of melodramas this year. The most recent episode is President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) meeting Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) in Taipei last week. Political observers have touted this event as a landmark peacemaking gesture to lessen cross-strait tensions.

Although the Ma-Chen meeting was brief, both sides reached a consensus on resolving longstanding disputes through peaceful means. During Chen’s visit, ARATS and the Straits Exchange Foundation also inked a pact on shortening air routes, permitting direct maritime shipping, enhancing cross-strait postal services and setting up a food security mechanism.

While these practical approaches have been hailed as conducive to conflict resolution in the Asia-Pacific rim, many have overlooked how sustainable and valid they are.

The fact is Chen’s visit was greeted by heated anti-China slogans and street protests. Violence and bloodshed occurred between pro-Taiwan and anti-China supporters, as well as clashes with the police. At one point, Chen and his delegation were stranded in a hotel for eight hours. Before Chen’s visit, his deputy, Zhang Mingqing (張銘清), had endured a similar ordeal when he was confronted by protesters in Tainan.

Sadly, a majority of Taiwanese media are famous for creating drama rather than impartiality. The pro-China media portrayed the series of confrontations and clashes as violence instigated by anti-China demonstrators and opposition leaders. Meanwhile, the pro-Taiwan media focused on showing footage of police attacking unarmed civilians. Society’s voice is divided on the issue, as the public argued about these so-called “riots” and violent incidents. Some have gone as far as to say that the opposition’s adoption of violence — instead of a rational and peaceful approach — was a sign of Taiwan’s regressive democracy.

Resorting to violence is wrong. But the message that underlies the violence is enormous. In repressive regimes, the oppressed sometimes have no other choice but violence to express their fury and draw international attention to their plight. Violence has also occurred in mature democracies. Think about G8 protests, right-wing and left-wing demonstrations in Europe. Violence has never been excluded as a way of voicing discontent in democratic or non-democratic states.

The violence that occurred in Taiwan may not be that destructive, but it still left a number of civilians and police injured. What is worse, it revealed a wound that has not been heeded in Taiwanese society — the ethnopolitical cleavage that has nearly torn the nation apart.

There have been many attempts but no single objective survey that could really show how many Taiwanese are pro-independence, pro-unification, pro-status quo or undecided. What is certain is there is a divide between people who aspire for more international respect for Taiwan’s distinct entity and those who pine for a gradual unification with China. None of Taiwan’s leaders, however, have taken this division seriously. Indeed, politicians have profited from this schism and mobilized it to further their political ambitions. There has hardly been any serious effort to objectively address this ethnopolitical cleavage and seek measures to close the growing tensions and misunderstanding between these two camps. This can be seen in pro-independence president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) eight-year rule, in which this populist leader endeavored to foster a unique Taiwanese identity at the expense of pro-China voices, eventually widening the ethnopolitical division in society.

Eight months after Ma’s presidential win in March and six months after his inauguration, Ma has trumpeted great gestures to “create peace” across the Taiwan Strait. However, Ma has been carrying out his ideal of peaceful resolution with China at a pace that Taiwanese are not ready for. He has ignored the ethnopolitical division that has deepened during his predecessor’s administration. And he forgets that as the leader of Taiwan, he should not repeat Chen Shui-bian’s one-sided approach and respond only to supporters that share his pro-China vision.

It is interesting that during Ma’s meeting with Chen Yunlin, the Chinese envoy repeatedly used “Mr” rather than “president” to address Ma to avoid acknowledging Taiwan’s sovereignty. Ma did not reject this treatment. This moderate Harvard law graduate might believe this was a sign of goodwill, but he should not forget that the 17 million eligible voters of Taiwan cast their ballot to select their “president.”

If Mr Ma aspires to leave a good name in history — as he has revealed in his recent peacemaking gesture — then he has to return to his own divided people and ask how peace and democracy can further progress in this land. He has to sow the seeds of mutual understanding and conciliation not just between people from both sides of the Taiwan Strait, but also between the two major rival political forces in Taiwan.

Many Taiwanese have resisted being used by populist and opportunistic politicians to stage violence. It is vital that the voice of these people be heard. More social forums and civic education programs should be initiated to discuss and learn conflict resolution, eventually allowing rationality, integrity and justice to lead mainstream opinion.

If one considers a fair deal entails both “giving” and “taking,” then one has to ask what both bargaining parties have conceded and profited from the agreement in the short and long term — beyond pure symbolic gestures to foster peace. The Taiwanese and Chinese representatives have not revealed the real costs and benefits of the recent deal to their respective constituents. The Chinese leaders obviously do not consider being responsive to their compatriots an issue or a priority. Ma, however, is the leader of a democracy and hence tasked with the responsibility to address the public’s concerns. This begs the question then of whether now is the right moment for both sides to move from alienation to intimacy and to close the deal in a rush.

In my view, both sides have much to learn and to improve in domestic politics. Before democracy is truly consolidated, leaders from both sides will not be able to build a sustainable and binding peace-building framework for the future. Ma should slow down his pace “outward” and strive to heal the wound that is tearing ears this country apart.

Yu-Wen Chen is a PhD candidate at the University of Konstanz in Germany.