More ugly KMT history revealed

Talk about an "exposé"

On Wednesday, the frequently sensationalist Apple Daily published pictures taken at the abandoned Ankeng Guesthouse (安康接待室/安康接待所) in Taipei County. These particular photos needed no embellishing -- in fact, portions (and not just the full name on a jar containing an object of mystery and suspicion) were obscured by a mosaic.

The ironically-named* Ankeng Guesthouse was a facility used during the White Terror period by the Taiwan Garrison Command (台灣警備總司令部) under the party-state of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) dictatorship.

In addition to hundreds of documents found at the scene which reports say are related to the interrogation of political prisoners, there were dozens of glass jars containing human body parts. The facility had been abandoned for quite some time and was missing even a front door.

Thursday's Taipei Times provided some of the English coverage:

Yesterday's Chinese-language Apple Daily reported that the documents [Maddog note: interrogation records], along with body parts in jars, had been left scattered at the Investigation Bureau's abandoned Ankeng Guesthouse in Taipei County.

[...]

The newspaper printed photos taken inside the building of human body parts in glass jars. Both the newspaper and the government said the body parts belonged to homicide victims and were unrelated to politics. [Maddog note: How credible is a statement like that?]

The newspaper's reporters were able to enter the derelict office and take photos of the documents and human remains.

[...]

Hsieh [former national policy adviser Hsieh Tsung-min (謝聰敏)] said: "They [Taiwan Garrison Command officials] told me they conducted human experiments on a mountain in Jingmei [景美], but few people knew where it was. Most people were taken to the place blindfolded and few of them came back."

He said both former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) had failed to conduct a proper investigation into the fates of political prisoners during the White Terror era.

Asked by the Taipei Times why the documents had not been dealt with under the two-term Chen administration, Cheng [DPP Spokesman Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦)] said the government had not been aware of them. Had it known, it would have requested action, he said.

Here's more from Thursday's Taiwan News:

Acting on information from local residents, reporters for the vernacular "Apple Daily" found files on about 500 former detainees tossed like garbage in the abandoned Ankang Reception Center in Hsintien, Taipei County Tuesday evening.

Built in 1973, the innocently named "reception center" was initially controlled by the now defunct Taiwan Garrison Command's Military Law Department Ankang Detention Center and served as a location for the detention and joint interrogation, including torture, of "seditionists" by TGC military court prosecutors and the Investigation Bureau until the lifting of martial law in July 1987.

Here's an earlier report via Wednesday's Taiwan News:

Most of the 50 files uncovered by the reporters dated back to Taiwan's White Terror period, when the Kuomintang government of President Chiang Kai-shek persecuted dissidents and people it suspected of sympathies for communism or for Taiwan Independence.

Subjects of the files included late opposition Democratic Progressive Party chairman Huang Hsin-chieh and former Vice Premier Chiou I-jen, the Apple Daily said.

The MJIB [Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau] said the files only contained the most basic information, including fingerprints and photographs, of people who had spent some time inside the building as detainees or interrogation subjects. The files were stored inside metal filing cabinets [Maddog note: See my notes about this further down in this post, below the video], so they had not been abandoned, the bureau said.

The bodies [sic; Maddog note: This should probably refer to body parts] at the Ankang Hostel were stored temporarily for research purposes until the newly established Ministry of Justice Coroners Research Institute had moved into its own site, the MJIB said.

After the media turned out in force at the site Wednesday, the MJIB mobilized police to keep reporters out, while cleaning personnel also arrived to spruce up the low concrete buildings and the surrounding woodland. [Maddog note: Couldn't this also be considered "tampering with evidence"?]

So far, I don't see any coverage of this story in the China Post.

Related video
Here's a Chinese-language report from FTV, uploaded by YouTube user jessie1229tw:


6:54 YouTube video: "20090318 安康接待所-民視新聞台"
Translation: "March 18, 2009: Ankeng Guesthouse - FTV News"
Look closely at the 2:02 mark in the above video, and you'll see that those documents that were supposedly "stored inside metal filing cabinets" don't quite match that description. You'll also hear former national policy adviser Hsieh Tsung-min talking about different forms of torture that were inflicted at the facility, including one that sounds a bit like waterboarding -- except that it used oil or even mace ("辣椒水").

Meanwhile, back at the Cabinet of Dr. Caligari...
The KMT currently has their sights on reopening the investigation of the March 19, 2004 shooting of former president Chen Shui-bian and his running mate Annette Lu (呂秀蓮). I don't object at all to further investigation (in fact, Chen and Lu both welcome it) -- as long as it's based on facts -- but the party who maintained their power via the torture at the Ankeng Guesthouse shouldn't be the ones conducting it.

Discussing the reasons for reopening the case, KMT chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) referred to "a lot of mystery and suspicion surrounding the incident." Unfortunately, there's far more "mystery and suspicion" surrounding his own party, and another investigation at this point in time would seem an awful lot like an attempt to divert the public's attention away from their own serious problems which foment hatred to this very day.

* The name is ironic because "Ankeng" (Ankang, 安康) means "safe and healthy" and because the so-called "guesthouse" was actually a torture facility.

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Les yeux sans visage: Taiwan, 台灣, Chinese Nationalist Party, 中國國民黨, Kuomintang, KMT, 國民黨, White Terror, 白色恐怖, 新華, Apple Daily, 蘋果日報, Ankeng Guesthouse, 安康接待室

Cross-posted at It's Not Democracy, It's A Conspiracy!

Ma Ying-jeou's survey dips to a new low

Presidency in limbo

According to a recent survey by the very pro-blue Global Views Magazine (遠見雜誌), Taiwan's president I-don't-mind-if-you-call-me-"Mr." Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) is faring even worse than George W. Bush with an approval rating of 24.9 percent. That's quite an "accomplishment" having been in office for only four months!

I don't have a direct link to the Global Views survey [UPDATE: Here's the link (560KB PDF file) /UPDATE], but here are the headlines of some Chinese-language news stories reporting the results [translations mine]:

* 遠見民調／從政以來最低民調　馬英九施政滿意度僅24.9% (via NOWnews, which is part of the pro-blue ETTV)
Global Views survey / Lowest rating since taking office, Ma Ying-jeou administration approval rating only 24.9%

* 從政以來最低 馬英九民望僅24.9% (via Apple Action News, a division of the dubiously-motivated Apple Daily)
Lowest since taking office, only 24.9% have hope for Ma Ying-jeou

* 馬上任四月施政滿意度僅24.9% (via Hong Kong's Ta Kung Pao [大公報], regarded by some as a mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party)
Ma in office four months, administration's approval rating only 24.9%

* 民調：馬英九獲從政來最差評價 64.5%民眾不滿意 (via China's official government "press agency," Xinhua [新华通讯社])
Survey: Ma Ying-jeou gets worst survey result since taking office, 64.5% of the people are dissatisfied

* 台刊民调：马英九上任4月施政满意度仅为24.9%
(via another Chinese government "agency" [read: mouthpiece], China News Service [中國新聞網 or 中新网])
Survey in Taiwan periodical: In office 4 months, approval rating of Ma Ying-jeou administration only 24.9%

Gee, I wonder how that could have happened...
This is clearly the result of Ma and his administration's damaging of Taiwan's sovereignty, their inability to live up to any of Ma's campaign promises, their mishandling of more than one typhoon, their slow, nonchalant, and inadequate reaction to the discovery of food products from China which contained potentially-fatal melamine, and their total failure to take responsibility for their own words and actions/inaction.

We're gonna get you, suckas!
Instead of responding to the opposition's reality-based attacks for all these things by changing tack, forming a new cabinet, or engaging in any introspection, they have decided instead to form a "counterattack squad." I wish I was kidding, but see for yourselves [translations mine]:

* 拒絕挨打 藍組反擊部隊 (via the pro-blue United Daily News [聯合報])
Refusing to take a beating, blues form counterattack squad

* 拒絕挨打、導正視聽　藍組“反擊部隊” (via the HK-based China Review News [中國評論新聞網])
Refusing to take a beating, countering the rumors, blues form "counterattack squad"

What they're saying is that they didn't do anything to cause such bad survey results and that it's all because the opposition -- meaning the DPP -- is spreading "rumors."

A brief history of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) "counterattacks"
For greater context, check out this nonsense from one year ago, from a source that could easily be called "an outlet for KMT propaganda" itself:

* Kuomintang tries counterattack on 'underground' radio stations (via the pro-unification China Post)

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- The opposition Kuomintang, convinced that it lost the last presidential election in 2004 because of a rumor spread by underground radio stations, is launching a counterattack.

Wu Dun-yih, secretary-general of the Kuomintang, confirmed yesterday his party is asking "licensed" radio stations to air its propaganda.

And here's another more recent display of how the kind of propaganda they're talking about works:

Executives at supermarkets and wholesale stores said that some international food and beverage giants used to enjoy brisk sales here.

But their milk powder made in China under contract has now suffered steep drops, although they vouch for the quality and safety of their products.

Bakeries in Taipei said sales of their products have also become victims of the negative publicity about the tainted milk powder.

The bakeries using Chinese milk powder are the victims -- but not the consumers who may have unknowingly ingested a toxic chemical? The "negative publicity" is the problem -- not the fact that this toxic chemical made its way into Taiwan's food supply?

This propaganda portrays the situation as if it hadn't yet been determined whether or not this melamine problem even existed. It treats it as if all of the potentially-toxic products -- containing some of the 25 metric tons (at least) of milk powder and other affected products which are known to have been imported into Taiwan -- had already been tested thoroughly and deemed safe. And it makes it sound as if the customers were being "unreasonable" when they had a valid reason to be concerned about their safety.

Is KMT-led Taipei totally free of melamine-tainted food, as the article implies? With the amount that made it into the country, I think that remains to be seen.

I am concerned... for the people of Taiwan
Not that I have even half an iota of concern about what Ma could do to boost his ratings, but it's certainly not impossible for him to do so. I won't hold my breath waiting for him to make that happen, but unless there's some serious change, I can only imagine Ma's ratings plunging even further -- and not because of any so-called "rumors."

苦民所苦
Here's a recent photo of Ma feeling somebody's pain -- most likely his own:

... and doing so while wearing a cap that says "ARG"! (out of view)
Ma's expression is the result of being scolded by a local official
-- from his own party! --
during a visit to Nantou several days after Typhoon Sinlaku had devastated the area.
(via the NOWnews article linked above)
Opposition rumors, my ass!

FURTHER READING (Lest we forget):
* Melamine was the chemical contaminant that was found in pet food produced in China in early 2007 and which "killed or sickened thousands of animals." Has anything changed?

* Pet Food Recall (Melamine)/Tainted Animal Feed

On March 15, 2007, FDA learned that certain pet foods were sickening and killing cats and dogs. FDA found contaminants in vegetable proteins imported into the United States from China and used as ingredients in pet food.

* Melamine in pet food may not be accidental

A nitrogen-rich chemical used to make plastic and sometimes as a fertilizer may have been deliberately added to an ingredient in pet food that has sickened and killed cats and dogs across the country, public and private officials say. A leading theory is that it was added to fake higher protein levels.

[...]

[...] "That melamine was found in all three of those, it would certainly lend credibility to the theory that this was intentional." [Stephen Sundlof, FDA chief veterinarian]

* Wikipedia: 2008 baby milk scandal

* Wikipedia: Food safety incidents in the People's Republic of China

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Baselines: Taiwan, 台灣, Ma Ying-jeou, 馬英九, I feel the people's pain, 苦民所苦, survey, 民調, Wu Den-yi, 吳敦義, propaganda, 宣傳, China Post, 英文中國郵報, People's Republic of China, 中華人民共和國, Xinhua, 新華, melamine, 三聚氰胺

Cross-posted at It's Not Democracy, It's A Conspiracy!

BBC has news about Taiwan totally backwards

With writing this bad, it's gotta be on purpose

In a spot-on impression of the "Newspeak" of George Orwell's 1984, yet another BBC article without a byline has distorted Taiwan with its "reporting." Somebody could start a whole blog just to expose the mess the BBC makes whenever they write about Taiwan. For now, you get to watch me rip another one of their articles to shreds.

Who hit whom first?
Right off the bat, the article sucker punches the observant reader with this headline:

China hits back at Taiwan leader

Rarely will they call Chen Shui-bian "president" in a headline, so I'm disappointed, though unsurprised. However, in order to "hit [someone] back," the other person has to "hit" first. For your information, this seems more like a first "hit" to me:


The article presses forward with this remarkably ignorant subhead:

A Chinese government spokesman has accused Taiwan's president of trying to ruin ties with the mainland.

How can you "ruin" something that's not good to begin with? And wouldn't it have been better to put "president" in the headline and "leader" in the subhead, or would that have made China's unelected leaders cry like they had Tabasco® in their eyes?

Skipping down to the third single-sentence paragraph below that subhead, we get this copy-and-paste piece of easy-to-repeat nonsense:

China sees Taiwan as part of its territory.

While that's essentially true that China "sees" things that way, the BBC's unnamed writer could have just as easily pasted in, "The people of Taiwan see China as a foreign country which constantly threatens their sovereignty." Rebecca MacKinnon once told me in all seriousness that this is simply the result of "journalistic laziness." If that were the case, I would seriously recommend that they try my equally-accurate version sometime. (I'm not holding my breath waiting for that to happen.)

Fists of factuality?
In a brief respite from the diligent "laziness," we get some facts about what President Chen said in his New Year's Day speech:

"Only the people of Taiwan have the right to decide on the future of Taiwan," Mr Chen said in his speech on Monday.

"Taiwan's sovereignty belongs to 23 million people. It definitely does not belong to the People's Republic of China," he said.

That, dear readers, is what the BBC implies to be a "hit" in its misleading headline. However, it is a simple historical fact that the PRC has never controlled Taiwan -- not even for a single day.

Here's how China responded to those historical facts:

A day later, the Chinese government made clear that it was not happy with Mr Chen's remarks.

An unnamed spokesman for the Taiwan Affairs Office told the state-run news agency, Xinhua, that Mr Chen "spares no effort to make disturbances".

"Chen intends to unreasonably restrict cross-Strait exchanges and cooperation... and ruin the peaceful and stable development of cross-Strait ties," he said.

"We will... never allow secessionists to separate Taiwan from the motherland in any name or by any way."

Every time Chen Shui-bian wakes up in the morning and brushes his teeth in the free country that is known as Taiwan, the leaders of the foreign country known as China are "not happy." Xinhua (新華, which is quite fittingly a homophone for 新話, or Newspeak) "spares no effort" to distort the truth. President Chen once again opened trade with China even further, probably to the dismay of many, and China's "anti-secession" law (which "legislates" the arbitrary use of "non-peaceful means" against Taiwan) hardly dictates that "cross-Strait ties" be described as "peaceful and stable." Furthermore, you can't "sece[de]" or "separate" from something you're not part of. It's both a physical and a logical impossibility. Taiwan is its own "motherland."

Here are two more muddled paragraphs:

China remains deeply suspicious of the Taiwanese leader and his independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party, accusing Mr Chen of planning constitutional changes that would destroy hopes of eventual reunification.

But despite his tough talk, Mr Chen has also made clear many times in the past that he has no plans to declare official independence except in the event of a Chinese invasion.

What "tough talk" are they babbling about? Did Chen threaten China when I wasn't looking? Despite what might superficially resemble balance in those two paragraphs, the article taken as a whole definitely leans way over towards China's bellicose perspective.

The final two paragraphs of the article provide more faux balance which observant readers would realize favors China by omission:

Tensions, though, are still high. Late last month China announced plans to upgrade its military, highlighting its dispute with Taiwan as one of several regional security threats.

Meanwhile, Taiwanese legislators have recently been discussing a controversial and much-delayed US arms deal package.

Balanced? Think again! The "arms" being offered to Taiwan are purely of a defensive nature, and if whoever wrote that doesn't know it, they have no business writing about Taiwan.

There's not much I left out, but if you so desire, follow the link up top and go read the rest of the nonsense. Just be sure to question everything written about Taiwan by the BBC.

RELATED LINKS:
* Transcripts of President Chen's New Year's Day speech can be read at the following links. [Hanzi] [English]
* A Taipei Times article about unelected Chinese "leader" Hu Jintao's (胡錦濤) same-day speech, "Hu stresses sharing the wealth in New Year's speech" (while number of missiles keeps increasing, "anti-secession" law still in place)
* Previous reamings of the BBC on Taiwan Matters! (all within the past 3 months):
1) BBC gets Taiwan all wrong
2) BBC angers all who care about Taiwan
3) BBC still not getting Taiwan right
4) BBC continues Taiwan deception
5) BBC strikes again
6) BBC Taiwan Coverage: Pathetically Biased
7) BBC cooks up more nonsense about Chen recall bid
8) Who will observe the Taiwan observers?

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Seeming defiers of the laws of physics: Taiwan, 台灣, Chen Shui-bian, 陳水扁, China, 中國, People's Republic of China, 中華人民共和國, PRC, 中共, Hu Jintao, 胡錦濤, missiles, 飛彈, media, 媒體, BBC, 英國廣播公司, Xinhua, 新華

Cross-posted at It's Not Democracy, It's A Conspiracy!