The Transitional Justice Commission is reportedly planning on validating and announcing 85 historical sites of injustice, as well as proposing legislative suggestions for preserving them.
After consulting experts and using the UN’s International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance as reference, the commission has drafted and finished revising key points in its final report on validating historical sites of injustice, which refer to places where those in power violated human rights during the authoritarian period.
The incidents span 1945 to 1992 and are mainly places where human rights violations occurred during the 228 Incident and the White Terror era, a commission member said.
More sites might be added, as investigation and research continue, the member said.
According to anonymous sources, the Yuan Ting police station in Keelung is one of the places that might be listed as a historical site of injustice.
The commission has also asked experts to produce a map of the sites.
Basic mapping data have been completed for six places, including the Investigation Bureau’s Ankang Reception House, sources said.
The commission has also arranged guided tours led by political victims to help visitors understand the environments in which people were detained during the authoritarian period.
The commission found that the Investigation Bureau set up a quasi-secret confinement center in the Taipei Detention Center that held political prisoners during the later stages of the Martial Law era.
In terms of investigations of historical sites of injustice, the commission has joined the New Taipei City Government in completing a boundary survey of the former Ankang execution grounds.
The Ankang site is where many political prisoners were executed after the mid-1950s, the commission said, adding that those who were executed there included Tang Shou-jen (湯守仁) and those involved in the Taiyuan Incident.
It was the longest-used execution site during the time of authoritarian rule, it said.
The commission said that its final report is to recommend a principle of preservation of the plans for historical sites of injustice.
For cases whose preservation involves property rights, major public interest, the financial burden of local self-governing groups or other matters that require the principle of legal reservation, the commission is considering proposing legislative suggestions for preserving historical sites of injustice, it added.
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