Taiwan is still full of reminders of the authoritarian era under Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) and his son Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國), with a total of 1,814 sites, monuments and office spaces named in memory of them, an average of one for every 20km2 in the nation, a Transitional Justice Commission report released on Friday said.
Taiwan has 1,235 monuments, statues, sculptures and large-frame portraits commemorating the two Chiangs, commission Chairwoman Yang Tsui (楊翠) said, adding that of those, 511 fall under the central government’s jurisdiction, and only 54 have been removed or renamed.
There are also 579 memorial sites and office spaces named in remembrance of them.
Photo: Chen Yu-fu, Taipei Times
Excluding the 227 statues of Chiang Kai-shek and two of Chiang Ching-kuo at the Cihu Memorial Sculpture Park in Taoyuan’s Dasi District (大溪), there are 848 statues of Chiang Kai-shek in Taiwan, of which 511 belong to local governments and 337 belong to the central government, the report said.
Taipei has the most statues of Chiang Kai-shek at 129, followed by Taoyuan at 112 and Taichung at 98, it added.
For those under the central government’s jurisdiction, most of the statues dedicated to the two Chiangs are located in agencies under the Ministry of National Defense, the Veterans Affairs Council and the Ministry of Education, the report found, adding that they have 276 in total, or 82 percent.
The three ministries also have the highest number of office spaces and sites dedicated to the two Chiangs at 143, or 89 percent.
Of the 419 statues, office spaces and sites, only five have been removed or repurposed, and that was mainly done by universities, commission Deputy Chair Yeh Hung-ling (葉虹靈) said, adding that as the military and other schools have differing views on the removal of statues or monuments of the two Chiangs, discussions with the three ministries are ongoing.
“There are many ways to handle these reminders of Taiwan’s authoritarian past, including removing them, repurposing them into open public sites or spaces for the arts ... while moving them to be stored at a warehouse is also another option, or transferring them to cultural parks,” said Yang, adding the commission would continue to keep track of how the government agencies are dealing with the matter.
The US government has signed defense cooperation agreements with Japan and the Philippines to boost the deterrence capabilities of countries in the first island chain, a report by the National Security Bureau (NSB) showed. The main countries on the first island chain include the two nations and Taiwan. The bureau is to present the report at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The US military has deployed Typhon missile systems to Japan’s Yamaguchi Prefecture and Zambales province in the Philippines during their joint military exercises. It has also installed NMESIS anti-ship systems in Japan’s Okinawa
‘WIN-WIN’: The Philippines, and central and eastern European countries are important potential drone cooperation partners, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung said Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) in an interview published yesterday confirmed that there are joint ventures between Taiwan and Poland in the drone industry. Lin made the remark in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper). The government-backed Taiwan Excellence Drone International Business Opportunities Alliance and the Polish Chamber of Unmanned Systems on Wednesday last week signed a memorandum of understanding in Poland to develop a “non-China” supply chain for drones and work together on key technologies. Asked if Taiwan prioritized Poland among central and eastern European countries in drone collaboration, Lin
NO CONFIDENCE MOTION? The premier said that being toppled by the legislature for defending the Constitution would be a democratic badge of honor for him Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday announced that the Cabinet would not countersign the amendments to the local revenue-sharing law passed by the Legislative Yuan last month. Cho said the decision not to countersign the amendments to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) was made in accordance with the Constitution. “The decision aims to safeguard our Constitution,” he said. The Constitution stipulates the president shall, in accordance with law, promulgate laws and issue mandates with the countersignature of the head of the Executive Yuan, or with the countersignatures of both the head of the Executive Yuan and ministers or
CABINET APPROVAL: People seeking assisted reproduction must be assessed to determine whether they would be adequate parents, the planned changes say Proposed amendments to the Assisted Reproduction Act (人工生殖法) advanced yesterday by the Executive Yuan would grant married lesbian couples and single women access to legal assisted reproductive services. The proposed revisions are “based on the fundamental principle of respecting women’s reproductive autonomy,” Cabinet spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) quoted Vice Premier Cheng Li-chiun (鄭麗君), who presided over a Cabinet meeting earlier yesterday, as saying at the briefing. The draft amendment would be submitted to the legislature for review. The Ministry of Health and Welfare, which proposed the amendments, said that experts on children’s rights, gender equality, law and medicine attended cross-disciplinary meetings, adding that
RSS