Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei mayoral candidate Sean Lien’s (連勝文) camp yesterday released a video of his wife, Patty Tsai (蔡依珊), recalling the time Lien was shot while stumping for KMT New Taipei City Councilor Chen Hung-yuan (陳鴻源) four years ago.
Lin Cheng-wei (林正偉) shot Lien at close range, with the bullet entering the left side of Lien’s face and exiting near his right temple.
Afterward, Lin said he had mistaken Lien for Chen. Lin was sentenced to life imprisonment in January last year.
In the video, Tsai says that despite his brush with death, Lien had not been simmering with resentment after the incident, nor had he become angry and misanthropic.
“That is why I like him, because he has been a sunshine boy,” she says.
The video then shows Tsai saying she believes God had a reason for helping Lien survive the shooting and appealing to Taipei voters to give him a chance.
“He always leaves a good impression on anyone who talks to him because he is very sincere,” she says.
Earlier in the day, when asked about the shooting, Lien said he would be lying if he said he was not haunted by the incident, adding that it had been life-changing.
“I began to think about what I could do to give back to society. Today [the anniversary of the shooting] really means a lot to me,” he said.
In other developments, Lien said he plans to donate the subsidy he will receive from the government for his votes in Saturday’s election to charity.
Lien made the remark when asked to confirm a report in the Chinese-language Next Magazine that he would announce a donation from his personal assets ahead of Saturday’s election to boost his chances.
“It [the magazine] got it wrong. We are planning to donate the NT$30 per vote subsidy,” Lien said as he canvassed for support at the Zhengyi Public Housing Complex (正義國宅) in the city’s Daan District (大安) last night.
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
Another wave of cold air would affect Taiwan starting from Friday and could evolve into a continental cold mass, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Temperatures could drop below 10°C across Taiwan on Monday and Tuesday next week, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. Seasonal northeasterly winds could bring rain, he said. Meanwhile, due to the continental cold mass and radiative cooling, it would be cold in northern and northeastern Taiwan today and tomorrow, according to the CWA. From last night to this morning, temperatures could drop below 10°C in northern Taiwan, it said. A thin coat of snow