Ma heckled by protesters during award ceremony
　

SURPRISE: After two members of a pro-Tibet group unfurled symbols of the region, a man interrupted Ma with accusations over the Lo Sheng Sanatorium
　

By Loa Iok-sin, Ko Shu-ling and Mo Yan-chih
STAFF REPORTERS
Thursday, Dec 11, 2008, Page 1
　

President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was heckled at the Asia Democracy and Human Rights Award ceremony in Taipei yesterday as pro-Tibetan and Lo Sheng preservation activists staged a surprise protest.

As Ma was being introduced to the audience, Taiwan Friends of Tibet (TFOT) members Tsai Chi-hsun (蔡季勳) and Yang Tsung-li (楊宗澧) took off their shirts and jackets to display T-shirts of the organization.

A Tibetan flag and the slogan “free Tibet” in English and “independence for Tibet” in Chinese were printed on the front of the shirts.

Not long after Ma began his speech, Yang held up a Tibetan flag, while Tsai displayed a photo of the Dalai Lama.

Bodyguards immediately rushed toward the two, asking them to put away the flag and the photo, but Yang and Tsai refused.

Security agents left them alone as they sat down and protested silently.

Ma ignored the protest and delivered a speech about Taiwan’s human rights achievements.

However, in the middle of Ma’s speech, a man from the audience suddenly pulled out a banner and shouted “the government intrudes upon the human rights of patients at the Lo Sheng Sanatorium.”

He was immediately escorted away by security personnel.

The Lo Sheng Sanatorium was built in 1930 by the Japanese colonial authority to house lepers.

Part of the compound was demolished last week to make way for the construction of a Mass Rapid Transport maintenance deport.

Ma regained his composure and said the unexpected episode only proved that Taiwan was a true democracy.

He said, however, that all parades or assemblies must be conducted in a legal manner with respect for other people’s freedoms.

“We support legal activities, but we crack down on illegal ones,” he said.

“Taiwan must enter a new stage. Elections are only a form of democracy. A true democracy is one that protects the people’s freedom, rights and the rule of law,” Ma said.

During his speech, Ma said that he would sign two UN human rights declarations and send them to the legislature for approval.

Ma said the UN General Assembly adopted the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in 1966, which were both signed by the Republic of China, but were never approved by the legislature.

They have been sent to the legislature for approval four times since 2001, Ma said, but the attempts were never successful.

He said he discussed the matter with Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) yesterday morning and told him he would like the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to submit the two conventions to the Executive Yuan for approval and then to the legislature.

“Once the legislature gives its endorsement, I will proclaim the two conventions and send them to the UN in accordance with international practice,” he said.

“We hope to apply international standards of human rights in the country,” he said.

The Ma administration has been harshly criticized over alleged human rights violations since Ma took office in May.

Many domestic and foreign human rights and media watch groups have expressed concern over alleged rights violations and restrictions on civil liberties since the visit of Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) early last month.

Ma said yesterday that during the 38-year Martial Law era, civil liberties were restricted and political persecution was rife. The situation improved when he was minister of justice in 1993, he said, whereupon Taiwan was upgraded to a free country by international human rights organizations.

Since he took office in May, Ma said his efforts to protect human rights had never flagged.

Following the ceremony, Yang and Tsai told reporters they were curious to know when an “appropriate time” for the Dalai Lama to visit Taiwan would be.

“Ma said earlier [last week] that the timing is not appropriate for the Dalai Lama to visit Taiwan. I’d like to ask him: ‘When would be an appropriate time?’” Yang told reporters after leaving the ceremony.

“Anyone who supports the idea of peace and freedom should be able to visit the free country of Taiwan,” Tsai said.

The Tibetan religious leader should be allowed a visit at any time as long as he has a legal status, they said.

Ma’s rejection of the Dalai Lama’s proposed visit has received much criticism.

Ma said during an interview with FTV on Tuesday that his decision had nothing to do Beijing and that the “appropriate time” would be a time “that is convenient for both of them.”

At a separate event later yesterday, Ma offered an apology to the victims and family members of the 228 Incident, promising to bring ethnic harmony in Taiwan.

“Mistakes can be forgiven, but history cannot be forgotten. We should learn the lessons from history and prevent any violations of human rights in future,” Ma said while addressing the opening ceremony of an exhibition at the Taipei 228 Memorial Museum.

The 228 Incident refers to the KMT government’s bloody crackdown on demonstrators and the local elite under the administration of dictator Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石).

The exhibition featured a video series created by 29-year-old Ho Hsin-yi (何欣怡), 228 victim Wang Tien-teng’s (王添燈) great-granddaughter.

Her works portray the life of her grandmother and other family members and told the history of the 228 Incident through the eyes of the family members of a 228 victim.

Ma, who offered an apology to the victims and their family members when he was Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman, promised to institutionalize the protection of human rights in Taiwan.

The Cabinet is expected to approve the two treaties today and send them to the legislature for final approval, the president said.

A middle-aged man shouted at police outside the venue after being prevented from approaching while Ma was addressing the ceremony.

The man condemned the government for ignoring his rights.

Ma did not respond to the protest.

The exhibition at the Taipei 228 Memorial Museum ends on Jan. 31.

Taiwan needs to decide on rights
　

By Herbert Hanreich
Thursday, Dec 11, 2008, Page 8

In celebrating the 60th anniversary of the proclamation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) on Dec. 10, 1948, the UN has invited all its member states to join in the party — despite the fact that some of the invitees have a disturbing human rights record. Taiwan, because of its international status, is not on the guest list. It is denied statehood and thus UN membership by the huge majority of that very same international community that received invitations to the global party on Human Rights Day.

Taiwan’s government, however, is not excluded from demonstrating its commitment to the provisions of the UDHR on that day. But there are doubts about the present administration’s stance on human rights, as recent violent events on the occasion of Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin’s (陳雲林) visit to Taipei suggest.

Likewise, President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) latest negative comments on a potential visit by the Dalai Lama next year nurture these doubts. The Ma administration has yet to make a clear statement where it stands on basic civil rights, which would also require a critical look into the ruling party’s dark human rights record, something it refuses to do. So why — and what — should Taiwan celebrate on Dec. 10?

Sixty years ago, for the first time in history, governments throughout the world agreed to respect the basic principles of inalienable rights of individuals regardless of their nationality, gender, ethnicity, creed, social status or political opinion. These rights were, and still are, considered to be the inalienable rights of each individual. They have also been described as the “ultimate norm of all politics” (Boutros Boutros-Ghali), meant to protect citizens against arbitrary and unlawful incursion by state officials into what is generally accepted to be either a public right or a private matter.

The UDHR emerged from the human catastrophes of World War II and what led to them, when millions of people were discriminated against, persecuted, tortured and often murdered by state mechanisms in the name of a superior race, a “true” political or religious system, or simply to eliminate political opposition.

In the past decade, and with the advancement of globalization, the UN’s policies have reframed the functions of human rights, endowing them with a more apparent role for the enhancement of economic and social development, for the process of democratization and good governance and for the establishment of peace and security.

These policies are contained in the “Millennium Development Goals,” a list of eight humanitarian challenges of the highest priority.

Former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan said: “We will not enjoy development without security, we will not enjoy security without development and we will not enjoy either without respect for human rights. Unless all these causes are advanced, none will succeed.”

The message was clear — peace, political stability, economic and social development and individual human rights are intrinsically linked to each other.

The perception that human rights center on the individual drew criticism in the late 1980s, especially from some Asian countries with authoritarian governments. They felt that the universality principle of the UDHR represented Western values. Genuinely Asian values were promoted instead, including, among others, nation before community, society above self and the family as the basic unit of society.

But it has become evident that the evocation of Asian values serves best those who hold political power (as much as so-called “family values” serve best those who are heads of the family) in countries without democratic representation for their citizens.

“Nation before self” is an adequate and convenient formula used to oppress any kind of political opposition under the aegis of Asian values. But it is one of the crucial points of the UDHR that the “essence” of human rights eludes any concrete social (family or community) or political (state) definition — their essence is that they are inalienable.

Human dignity does not depend on the myopic views of politicians with a decidedly regional mindset.

Quite understandably, totalitarian governments do not like any idea of universal human rights. They would not like to accept that “everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal,” because there are no independent and impartial tribunals in their countries.

Neither would they like to read that “everyone has the right to freedom and thought, conscience and religion,” because such freedom does not exist in their countries.

In non-democratic countries these freedoms simply do not exist.

China has a dismal human rights record and there is an awkward logic behind this since Beijing places political and national stability, and, in its wake, social and economic development at the top of its agenda, high above the dignity of the individual.

I wonder how those Chinese individuals who are deprived of their individual human rights would judge these very same Asian values by which they were or are politically oppressed.

I suggest we ask them. But this is exactly what “Asian” human rights would disallow. The “right to freedom and thought” is not inalienable in the canon of “Asian” human rights.

Taiwan has to decide where it stands — on the side of the rule of law based on individual human rights, or on the side of law and order prioritizing national stability.

Only in the first case does Taiwan have a good and legitimate reason to commemorate Human Rights Day.

Herbert Hanreich is an assistant professor at I-Shou University.