Lee Ching-yu (李凈瑜) — wife of Taiwanese human rights advocate Lee Ming-che (李明哲), who is imprisoned in China on charges of subversion — yesterday said her husband might be pressured into pleading guilty when his trial opens tomorrow.
“At this moment, I want to ask my compatriots for their understanding if they see him do or say anything unbearable in court outside of his free will,” she told a news conference in Taipei. “This is just the Chinese government being adept” at forcing confessions, she said.
She said she would attempt to enter China on a landing visa today, as moves by the Chinese government have thrown her invitation to observe her husband’s trial into doubt.
Photo: EPA
The Mainland Affairs Council, which has been helping arrange plane tickets and travel documents, has advised her to attempt to enter China on a landing visa, following the failure of an application for a new “Taiwan Compatriot Permit” after she refused to renew contact with her husband’s Chinese-appointed lawyer, she said.
She said a man named Zhang Zhongwei (張忠偉) called her on Thursday to inform her of her husband’s impending trial at the Intermediate People’s Court in Yueyang, Hunan Province, instructing her to immediately apply for travel documents.
“As I do not acknowledge the validity of the Chinese court, I will not get involved in legal details other than asking the time and location of the trial, because I want to see my husband,” Lee Ching-yu said. “I am not going to participate, I am going to see my husband and tell him I stand with him.”
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
Her previous Taiwan Compatriot Permit was revoked by Beijing in April, which prevented her from flying to China to search for her husband.
Judicial Reform Foundation executive secretary Hsiao I-ming (蕭逸民) said that he, former Democratic Progressive Party legislator Wang Li-ping (王麗萍), one unnamed human rights advocate and officials from the council and the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) have sent official applications to China’s Taiwan Affairs Office to accompany Lee Ching-yu to the trial, but the prospects look bleak.
“We will not attempt to attend or get close to the trial site as private individuals, because that would very likely result in a second Lee Ming-che. We will go only if we receive official permission,” Wang said, adding that she had directly contacted the Yueyang court.
The court said that while Lee Ming-che is to be given an “open” trial, Taiwanese may only observe if they receive permission from the Taiwan Affairs Office, she said.
“Under Chinese law, only close relatives — namely Lee Ming-che’s wife, mother and father — have a right to attend, and it looks like authorities will not permit anyone else, including SEF officials,” Wang said.
“While they are saying this is an open trial, that is not the truth if they are only going to let their own people observe,” Taiwan Association for Human Rights secretary-general Chiu Ee-ling (邱伊翎) said, echoing advocates’ charges that China is taking steps to ensure its full control over a show trial.
“In choosing to put on an open trial, the signal they are sending is that Lee Ming-che is going to make a public confession. The Chinese lawyer’s manipulation of his mother is just more proof that this is all a show,” Wang said.
She was referring to reports on Friday that Lee Ming-che’s mother, who is in her 70s and has never appeared publicly in connection with the case, had suddenly applied through the council to attend the trial.
Lee Ching-yu confirmed that she had sent the council a message in an attempt to prevent her mother-in-law’s attendance at the trial.
“My objective was to save a desperate situation and stop a humiliating show,” she said.
Lee Ming-che’s mother has a “different political stance” from her son and daughter-in-law and has called on her son to “apologize to his Chinese mother country” after learning of his detention, Wang said.
She also threw out his collection of books and political materials during Lee Ching-yu’s trip to the US in May, she added.
While Lee Ming-che has been charged with attempting to overthrow the Chinese government, Lee Ching-yu has maintained that he was visiting China to share Taiwan’s “experience of democratization” with Chinese friends.
The Chinese government has apparently decided to wrap up Lee Ming-che’s case prior to the Chinese Communist Party’s 19th National Congress next month, even though a final outcome remains uncertain, Wang said.
“The problem is that his mother’s paperwork has gone through, but ours has not,” Wang said. “Chinese authorities seem to be making participation dependent on whether Lee Ching-yu will play their assigned role for her.”
While the council requested that Lee Ching-yu contact her husband’s lawyer, its advice that she pursue a landing visa demonstrates that it has had some contact with Chinese authorities, despite official avowals to the contrary, Wang said, adding that Lee Ching-yu rejected its requests because her husband’s case is a “political question.”
Chiu said that she and Covenants Watch chief executive officer Huang Yi-bee (黃怡碧) are to still meet tomorrow for an initial UN Human Rights Council Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances meeting on Lee Ming-che’s case.
The sudden announcement and timing of his trial have effectively forestalled Lee Ching-yu’s participation at the meeting, she added.
Additional reporting by CNA and AP
ENDEAVOR MANTA: The ship is programmed to automatically return to its designated home port and would self-destruct if seized by another party The Endeavor Manta, Taiwan’s first military-specification uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) tailor-made to operate in the Taiwan Strait in a bid to bolster the nation’s asymmetric combat capabilities made its first appearance at Kaohsiung’s Singda Harbor yesterday. Taking inspiration from Ukraine’s navy, which is using USVs to force Russia’s Black Sea fleet to take shelter within its own ports, CSBC Taiwan (台灣國際造船) established a research and development unit on USVs last year, CSBC chairman Huang Cheng-hung (黃正弘) said. With the exception of the satellite guidance system and the outboard motors — which were purchased from foreign companies that were not affiliated with Chinese-funded
PERMIT REVOKED: The influencer at a news conference said the National Immigration Agency was infringing on human rights and persecuting Chinese spouses Chinese influencer “Yaya in Taiwan” (亞亞在台灣) yesterday evening voluntarily left Taiwan, despite saying yesterday morning that she had “no intention” of leaving after her residence permit was revoked over her comments on Taiwan being “unified” with China by military force. The Ministry of the Interior yesterday had said that it could forcibly deport the influencer at midnight, but was considering taking a more flexible approach and beginning procedures this morning. The influencer, whose given name is Liu Zhenya (劉振亞), departed on a 8:45pm flight from Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) to Fuzhou, China. Liu held a news conference at the airport at 7pm,
Taiwan was ranked the fourth-safest country in the world with a score of 82.9, trailing only Andorra, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in Numbeo’s Safety Index by Country report. Taiwan’s score improved by 0.1 points compared with last year’s mid-year report, which had Taiwan fourth with a score of 82.8. However, both scores were lower than in last year’s first review, when Taiwan scored 83.3, and are a long way from when Taiwan was named the second-safest country in the world in 2021, scoring 84.8. Taiwan ranked higher than Singapore in ninth with a score of 77.4 and Japan in 10th with
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
RSS