Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) yesterday said that his proposal to amend the Act Governing the Recovery of Damage of Individual Rights During the Period of Martial Law (戒嚴時期人民受損權利回復條例) aims to expand the legal basis for victims of the White Terror era and Martial Law period to claim compensation from the state.
Many of the cases were not limited to the Criminal Code and should the amendment be passed, people prosecuted for contravening of the now-defunct punishment of rebellion act and the espionage laws of the period of the communist rebellion would also be eligible to file for state compensation, Chiang said.
People who has received a presidential reinstatement of integrity certificate, or those whose guilty verdict was overturned through the Act on Promoting Transitional Justice (促進轉型正義條例) would also be eligible, Chiang said.
Photo: CNA
According to the draft, if the person has passed away, their descendants or legally designated inheritor in Taiwan may also ask for their assets to be returned, he said.
If the assets are unable to be returned, or cannot be returned in their original state, the claimant may request that the government pay an appropriate sum instead, he said.
If the draft is passed, the official name of the act would be changed to the restoration of individual rights under the autocratic rule period act, Chiang said.
Chiang said he has always supported openly discussing the events of the White Terror era and Martial Law period, and that he expressed such sentiments when Formosan Political Prisoners’ Association honorary director-general Tsai Kuan-yu (蔡寬裕) visited the KMT’s Legislative Yuan caucus in 2017.
When the Legislative Yuan passed the Act on Promoting Transitional Justice on Dec. 5, 2017, Chiang said that he supported Article 6, which was proposed by the Democratic Progressive Party to redress judicial wrongs.
The article is aimed at facing history and restoring the truth, which is the first step Taiwanese must take to putting their past behind them, he said.
Chiang denied accusations that he was making the proposal to gain support for his bid to run as the party’s candidate for Taipei mayor next year.
Many of the victims are old and he wishes to expedite government compensation efforts, he said.
The great-grandson of former president Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石), Chiang Wan-an said that he had not spoken with his father, former KMT vice chairman John Chiang (蔣孝嚴), about the amendment.
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