21 Oct, 2008 in Taiwan by Fili An Tags: China; cross strait; dpp; kmt; Taiwan;

An NCKU international student makes Taiwan’s front page headlines

Academic achievements? inspired research? not quite. I see the NCKU news center try to make headlines but even the most impressive discoveries and inventions barely make it to page 3. This international student made it to most of the 8 o’clock news and appeared on Taipei Times front page . Here’s how :

 

An NCKU International Student makes Taiwan’s front page headlines

A protester holds up a sign in front of Zhang Mingqing, vice chairman of China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, at an academic forum at Tainan National University yesterday. Zhang’s speech was canceled after the protest.
PHOTO: LIU WAN-CHUN

He’s not your usual international student. He’s an ABT. He’s studying with the international business PhD program in NCKU, so when I was zapping through the Taiwanese channels last night and noticed his face I paused and watched. There was a whole feature on him and his background as a Taiwanese who was educated abroad, travelled all over the world, but came back here because he wholeheartedly loves Taiwan. Taipei Times has more with “PRC official receives ‘special welcome’”:

HECKLED: After a protester interrupted a planned speech by the vice chairman of China’s ARATS, Tainan National University canceled his activities for two days.

One of China’s top negotiators yesterday experienced firsthand a “special welcome” from Tainan residents as a group of protesters disrupted his speech at an academic forum.

Zhang Mingqing (張銘清), vice chairman of China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS), arrived in Taiwan on Sunday at the head of a 21-member Chinese academic delegation to attend the 2008 Cross-Strait Academic Symposium on Mass Communications and Image Arts at Tainan National University of the Arts in Guantian Township (官田), Tainan County.
Before Zhang was to speak at the auditorium, a man holding a banner reading in English “Taiwan is independent [sic], not a part of China,” sprinted up to the podium and began shouting slogans. The man, surnamed Chang, was escorted away with two other protesters, one man and one woman.

Chang later told reporters he was just a normal Taiwanese and that he was not a member of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

The graduate student from National Cheng Kung University said he was born in the US to Taiwanese parents and came back eight years ago to learn Hoklo (also known as Taiwanese) and Taiwanese culture.

“There are many people around the world who have deep respect for Taiwan,” he said in Hoklo. “I don’t want to see Taiwan bullied.”

Chang said he and the other protesters hid the banners in their bags to pass through the security check. Security personnel reluctantly let them in after they failed to show identification cards. […]

In response, university staff said that Zhang was attending the symposium in his capacity as dean of Xiamen University’s School of Journalism and Communication and the seminar was an academic gathering that had nothing to do with politics.

Zhang did not give his speech and after discussions, the university authorities canceled all his appearances for the next two days. […]

Visibly amused by the protest, Zhang told the audience that the organizer told him that Tainan residents were very “hospitable” and that they would welcome him and the delegation in a “special” way.

“I did not expect to see the special welcome happen so suddenly,” he said. “I think we see some things very differently.” […]

Quite the operation. You got to admit the guys has guts.

Take a look at the video :

I just heard on ICRT news that the Chinese visitor was attacked later on today while visiting some tourist attractions in Tainan, so this is turning violent.  UPDATE – the guy probably tripped on something. How ridiculous.

Ma Ying Jiu, I believe, is succeeding where Chen Shui Bian failed – getting the Taiwanese to really consider who they are and what they stand for. The upcoming DPP protest in Taipei, expected to draw a million protestors, is all due to Ma Ying Jiu’s policy regarding cross strait relations and so even those who are not strong DPP supporters are feeling somewhat uncomfortable with how fast and how big the change is. KMT supporters that I know (disclaimer – mostly here in DPP land Tainan) are feeling confused and frustrated, maybe even betrayed. Whether one supports DPP or not, KMT or not, it’s good this public discussion regarding cross-strait relations is finally taking place, and the Taiwanese are being made to take a stand on this issue. Regardless of Taiwanese independence yes or no, I don’t enjoy watching Taiwan being bullied and manipulated by external forces. This whole political situation is tragic.

Enjoyed this article? Subscribe to the RSS Feed
or register for email updates
Related Posts

If you found this page useful, consider linking to it.
Simply copy and paste the code below into your web site (Ctrl+C to copy)
It will look like this: An NCKU international student makes Taiwan’s front page headlines

  • Jim
    Zhang Mingqing is not friendly towards Taiwan. In response to Ma saying "no war for the next four years between Taiwan and China", he said, "if there's no Taiwanese independence, then there won't be war". Basically a totally provocative statement that is no different from a thug that sticks you up and says "give me all your money and you won't get hurt". No goddamn respect or even idea of manners at all

    If you want to know this character for who he is, look up the very threatening and very provocative things he said about Taiwan in the 90s. So this guy coming to Taiwan is going to be treated... well? After all that's happened between China and Taiwan these past 10 years and him being in the middle of all of it?

    The really funny thing is he filed charges in Taiwan over tripping over. What?! Isn't Taiwan a part of China? Did he just recognize Taiwan's sovereignty? Heh heh. Nice!
  • cat
    1. the so-called democracy do happen in the Republic of China.

    2. What's the produce of the democracy and the civilization of human being in Taiwan? Barbaric personal attack on an unarmed 60 years old man.

    3. Do you really wanna the Taiwan-style democracy to take place in the mainland? As I mentioned earlier in these comments, most people of the mainland would surely and democratically vote for unifying Taiwan immediately and eliminating the die-hard greens.

    4. That's why I call it a not-so-mature democracy or a pseudo-democracy, which easily leads to populism, just like what's happening now in Taiwan, and its extreme example is Nazi.

    5. I accept your apology.
  • vk
    I am not saying what they've done was right, I feel sorry about what happened. And I feel sad to see that, after all those years, it seems DPP still not find a way/their way to takle with China...

    It is the politician and the government that need to take the responsibility,
  • vk
    Cat:

    You say what you wanna say, you prove what you wanna prove.
    You can call Taiwanese 'barbarians' or anything as you wish,yet the truth is, the democracy is the achievement of 'civilisation' in human beings' hisotry, and it's been happening/operating in Taiwan for years, not in China.

    And that's the only reason allows those people go protesting about Chang/Zhang's visiting.In Beijing, without a governemt permission, I doubt if this will ever happen.( Oh maybe yes they could, but see what happened to 六四, to those brave students and people!)

    Moreover, this might partly answer to your qestion about DPP politicians' visit to China. If the China governement blocked the news about their visiting, or promoted their visiting as a 'friendship' between two parties regardless of whatever the truth is, I doubt any one would have go to 'protest' about it.

    It is China who always wanna 'invade' the autonomy of Taiwan,take over Taiwan and not vice versa.
    (here I refer to 'actual invasion and interference')
    It seems to naive to make your simple comparison without looking at deeper political and power structure.

    Above all, trying to prove Taiwanses barbarians or anything worse doesn't make China better.

    PS. Personally, I would take this confrontation (not violence, the real violence is the thousonds of missiles deployed by China aiming to Taiwan) is a alarm to Ma's imprudent inclination to Chian governemt.
  • cat
    Never mind. You are still a young man, after all, and you need to learn much more.
  • cat - Sorry. I might have been brainwashed by your "violent" "not-so-mature" "so-called democracy" of the "populist" "barbarians".
  • cat
    Come on, Fili, make some sense. You have got as "passionate" as your dear friends. That is not good. :-(
  • cat - :O Taiwanese barbarians? my friends?

    The fact that you don't see the provocation goes to show that you fail to understand just how sensitive this issue is here in Taiwan, especially in Tainan. Tainan welcomes the few Chinese tourists who choose to come here after direct flights opened and restrictions eased, but having this particular visitor over - even for academic purposes - is more sensitive.

    Since you've turned all Taiwanese into blood hungry animals preying on the poor helpless Chinese, I'll just say that I'm constantly surprised how non-violent the Taiwanese are regarding this issue. Never, ever, have I heard of people, like Taiwanese, that only promote independence without resulting to terror or violent protest. So some Taiwanese interrupted the guy's speech and danced on his car... you call that violence?

    Chinese have their own share of extremists, on a wide variety of political issues, hunting down Taiwanese holding Taiwan flags across the world is just one of them. Here's one from today about a clash with Japanese students: http://ionlylikechina.blogspot.com/2008/10/chin... . China experiences over 15000 violent protests within China every year. This isn't to say that Chinese are violent. This isn't to say that Chinese hate Taiwanese. It is to say that this topic is sensitive and people react passionately about it, with some extremists taking it too far.
  • cat
    I am not so optimistic. Democracy, esp. a not-so-mature democracy, easily leads to populism, just like what Taiwan currently is like.
  • or they might begin to think for themselves. wouldn't that be a miracle?
  • cat
    Thanks god. The mainland China is not so democratic as Taiwan, or those pro-independence would have already been eliminated by those Chinese Klein makes business with.:DDDDDD
  • Cat, no they didn't. that's of little consequence however, for we were there to make money for them, so naturally they wouldn't have physically attacked us. but they made damn sure that we know how they felt and that voting for the DPP would create problems (as if it was any of their business). the Chinese were always in the Taiwanese's faces about politics, making everyone uncomfortable about being from Taiwan. in every case, they started the "discussion."

    on our business trips there, it seems that Chinese love to argue about nothing, disputing well known facts and ignoring reality. after that, nothing surprises me.

    i cannot tell you what would have happened if we were an official government delegation to take over the country, but i could take a good guess.

    in other situations, i've had it "explained" to me by angry Chinese, whom i felt didn't attack me physically because of my size.
  • cat
    MJ Klein- At least they did not physically attack those from Taiwan.
  • whenever we got to China on business, someone brings up some kind of crap about Taiwan, and most often the Chinese try to force the Taiwanese to say who they voted for President.
  • cat
    That is the point. As no Taiwan official whose job description is “in charge of promoting Taiwanese independence” visit mainland China, Mr. Zhang Mingqing's job is not in charge of promoting the unification of China, either. As it is mentioned in your this article he visited Taiwan this time to attend an academic symposium, and his office is vice chairman of China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, a non-governmental organization, at least namely. I see no any provocation in his visit but he unfortunately received such an irrationally violent treatment.
    Inevitably the issue of Taiwan is an awkward topic between those coming from both sides of the Strait and, to my knowledge, they just always try to avoid it in communication. Generally current Chinese folks are not so concerned with such political issue, not to say perform any personal attack for its end. If someone from Taiwan would feel unsafe to respond to such a topic, well, I can only say barbarians always take others as barbarians too. You know, members of the Lifayuan often would physically attack their fellows when disputing on a bill. After all, this is Taiwan's so-called democratical culture and they have been used to it.
  • cat - the only problem with what you're saying (and my ignorance) is that they're all perceived as appeasing the Chinese, not as representing what they stands for, which most Chinese and especially the Chinese government find offensive. I think that even having a Taiwanese official whose job description is "in charge of promoting Taiwanese independence" visit China would create a slight problem.

    I happened to see a few pro-independent officials and citizens express their opinions outside China and be bullied/silenced by the Chinese living there. Most of my Taiwanese friends who happened to visit China (some very KMT) felt utterly uncomfortable by Chinese attitudes expressed when learning they're Taiwanese on the subject of Taiwan being part of China even if they tried their best to avoid the topic. They felt it was safer to keep quiet about how they see thing. What would happen if they respond? I honestly don't know.

    It wasn't long ago that we both discussed Chinese not allowing Taiwanese to display a flag of what you referred to as a non-existing country. And that was abroad.

    If Chen Shui Bian, while visiting China, would - God forbid - say something hinting in the direction of pro-independence my guess is that he - at best - wouldn't be standing up very long.

    But I apologize - that just might be my ignorance.
  • cat
    "Even though China is more strict on security and protest, I wonder how a DPP pro-independence official would be welcomed in Beijing"

    How ignorant! In fact a lot of DPP officials have already, and frequently, visited the mainland. For example, a certain DPP female representative in the Lifayuan claimed after this attack that they do not regard such a person like Zhang as guest, but rather enemy. As a matter of fact not only this lady herself has ever visited the mainland for times, but also her husband is running a factory there. Even our scandle hero Chen Shui-bien, too, visited Beijing years before. Every year hundreds of thousands of people from Taiwan visit the mainland and by no means some of them are pro-independence, but no one of them has ever been attacked just like Zhang for their political point of view.
  • I'll just repost the comment I posted in Michael's -

    Not that it's comparable and I don't support violence, but if this was an Israeli official visiting Palestinian Ramallah, he probably wouldn't last 5 seconds, and I'm not talking about standing up.

    Even though China is more strict on security and protest, I wonder how a DPP pro-independence official would be welcomed in Beijing.

    Anyways, I think having him visit Tainan was insensitive to how most of DPP land Tainan folks feel towards such a visit.

    Regardless, what I really don't get is where the security and police were in all this.
  • cat
    Finally they did it.
    The populist in Taiwan are not content with so-called peaceful protest any more.
    However, they have found a wrong victim. In fact, Zhang Mingqing (張銘清) is one of the most Taiwan-friendly characters in the mainland. His being attacked will by no means harm Taiwan's prestige of democracy and legality among the people of the mainland China, and it will also impaire the influence of those enhancing the friendship and exchange across the Strait.
  • Anonymous
    Beating up is wrong, but WELL DONE this time!!!!Sadly didn't beat him up too hard!!! This kind of tragedy will never stop...Taiwanese already get used to it!! And KMT only say that DDP supporters are barbarians..
  • the guy is not a "normal" Taiwanese as he was educated abroad. let's hope the normal Taiwanese learn from this example.
blog comments powered by Disqus