Media exemption on Data Protection Act: a myth?

In passing a controversial amendment to the Computer-Processed Personal Data Protection Act (電腦保護個人資料處理法) on April 27, the legislature announced that media would be exempt from provisions making it obligatory to inform and seek consent from individuals before collecting and reporting personal information.

It was not my intention, as a member of the media, to test whether that exemption would apply when, on April 23, I sent a request for information to the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) seeking information on a top triad organization in Taiwan after being commissioned by a reputable British publication to write an article about it. Four days later, the CIB replied with the following:

答覆內容：
先生（小姐）您好：
您於99年4月23日寄給本局的電子郵件，茲回復如下：

有關請求提供 [...] 相關資料1案，因本案涉及個人資料保護，依據「電腦處理個人資料保護法」第8條之規定「公務機關對個人資料之利用，應於法令職掌必要範圍內為之，並與蒐集之特定目的相符。」及「政府資訊公開法」第18條第4款規定：「政府機關為實施監督、管理、檢（調）查、取締等業務，而取得或製作監督、管理、檢（調）查、取締對象之相關資料，應限制公開或不予提供之。」，故無法提供 [...] 相關資料，尚請見諒!謝謝來信，敬祝安康!

Roughly translated, the CIB’s response reads as follows:

Hi,

This is in reply to your message, dated April 23, 2010, sent to the Criminal Investigation Bureau:

As this case involves the protection of personal data, in accordance with Article 8 of the Computer-Processed Personal Data Protection Act (電腦保護個人資料處理法), we are unable to provide you with information on the [deleted by me] … Article 18, paragraph 4, states: “Unless for a specific purpose and satisfying any of the following requirements,* a non-government organization should not collect or process by computer personal data.”

* Exceptions as stipulated in the Act:
1. Upon written consent from the party concerned;
2. Having a contractual or quasi-contractual relationship with the party concerned and
having no potential harm to be done to the party concerned;
3. Such personal data is already in public domain and having no harm to the major
interest of the party concerned;
4. For purpose of academic research and having no harm to the major interest of the
party concerned; or
5. Specifically provided by the relevant laws in Article 3(7) ii and other laws.

The fact that, in my query, I clearly identified myself as a member of the media, both as a reporter for the Taipei Times and for the British organization (which I named in my e-mail), and provided my address and phone number at work was insufficient for the CIB to give me the information that I sought. Now, the amendment that cleared the legislative floor on April 27 stipulates that non-governmental organizations or individuals are allowed to search and collect generally accessible data about individuals when acting in the “public interest.” In other words, Netizens who launch a campaign to identify individuals involved in violations such as animal abuse would not be considered violators.

I find it difficult to understand how a report on a major criminal syndicate operating in Taiwan, China, Hong Kong and the Western coast of the United States would not be in the ill-defined “public interest,” or how it would be permissible to collect information on someone who abuses animals, but not so about individuals who engage in drug and human trafficking, among other crimes.

Clearly, the media exemptions do not apply, or someone is trying to protect the triads, which wouldn’t be surprising, given the close relationship between government officials and crime syndicates in Taiwan.

China Times Group slams criticism of CCP official’s visit

The Want Want China Times Group went on the offensive on Tuesday after the Chinese- language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) carried a story about Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators criticizing a visit by a Chinese Communist Party (CCP) official to CtiTV and the “supplicant” manner in which the group’s chairman welcomed the official.

CtiTV, part of the China Times Group acquired by food conglomerate Want Want in November 2008, dedicated an entire hour-long program on Tuesday night, with special guests including Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Alex Tsai (蔡正元), attacking the Liberty Times and its president, and alleging that the Liberty Times’ poll center had faked a poll following Sunday’s debate between President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with China.

The Chinese-language China Times continued the offensive with six articles targeting the Liberty Times yesterday, including a front-page story and an editorial.

On its front page on Monday, the China Times quoted Want Want chairman Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明) as saying during the visit on Sunday: “On behalf of all colleagues at Want Want Group, I welcome CCP Hubei Provincial Committee Secretary Luo Qing quan (羅清泉).”

Luo’s tour included a visit to the CtiTV newsroom.

“After its initial investments in Hubei Province, Want Want Group is confident that investments in Hubei will expand in the future,” Tsai Eng-meng said. “We welcome Luo’s visit here to give us his guidance [蒞臨指導, lilin zhidao] and thank you for your support,” he said.

Luo is leading a 1,000-strong delegation from Hubei to enhance exchanges between his province and Taiwan. The delegation is expected to make more than US$500 million in purchases during the visit, organizers say.

DPP Legislator William Lai (賴清德) said Tsai Eng-meng seemed oblivious to the constitutional status of independent media, adding that the tendency in China to “seek the wisdom” of Chinese officials had no place in Taiwanese media or in a democratic society.

The executive deputy editor at the China Times played down the accusation on Monday night, saying the “seeking the wisdom” reference was polite language. He added that only “bored people” would make a fuss over this.

DPP Legislator Chen Ting-fei (陳亭妃), however, said the language made it very clear that the Chinese were the main objects of dependence, adding that using such vocabulary to welcome Chinese officials was not accidental.

The China Times Group also owns the Commercial Times, the China Times Weekly magazine, Want Daily and China Television Co, which was formerly controlled by the KMT. All have a pro-China editorial line.

In February last year, Want Want signed a preliminary deal to acquire a 47.58 percent stake in Asia Television (ATV) in Hong Kong, which in recent years has been accused of adopting a pro-Beijing line. Tsai Eng-meng is currently locked in a court battle over control of the broadcaster.

The Liberty Times said yesterday it planned to take legal action against the Want Want China Times Group over “groundless accusations.”

The following was cut from the printed version of the article, which appeared today in the Taipei Times.

Want Want also operates hotels in Shanghai, Nanjing, Huaian and Xining.

The Hong-Kong-listed Want Want, whose main market is China but also sells in Taiwan and Hong Kong, has a 51 percent controlling stake in China Times Group.

* * *

What I find worrying about this development is not so much Tsai’s — and his group’s — warm welcome of Secretary Luo. After all, Want Want is heavily invested in China and prostrating themselves before the CCP envoy can only increase their chances of expanding their business there. While fault can be found in this act alone, and while this raises questions about the impact of business interests on the media (a global problem), what really matters is that a senior CCP official is allowed to physically visit a media outlet in Taiwan. Around the same time, a cultural delegation from Hebei, including the province’s top propaganda official, was also visiting Want Want China Times Group media outlets. As Christine Loh pointed out in her magnificent book Underground Front, Tsai’s involvement in Taiwanese and Hong Kong media could be a sign that Beijing’s United Front campaign is now gaining adherents in Taiwan. Add such media to China’s growing global media campaign and the rest of the world can be excused for being misinformed about the realities in Taiwan, given that the voices that dare tell a different side to the story — Taiwan’s side — are becoming weaker and are constantly under assault, as was the Liberty Times in my story. That assault, furthermore, comes both from pro-Beijing media and, as KMT Legislator Alex Tsai’s participation in the televised assault shows us, the government. It may not be a coincidence that the Liberty Times, which as a rule always chose not to fight back or launch lawsuits, is this time around considering doing just that.

Ma promotes ECFA to foreign press

President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) continued his campaign to explain his rationale for signing an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with China yesterday when he addressed the Taiwan Foreign Correspondents’ Club in Taipei.

In his brief introduction, Ma said that Sunday’s debate on an ECFA with Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) had helped increase the number of people who understood the trade pact, as well as public support for it, without providing sources.

“In the last 10 years, we have seen tremendous change in Asia. In year 2000, we had only three free-trade agreements,” Ma said in English. “By last year, the number went up to 58. Taiwan should not be isolated in this reform.”

“I’ve always said that we can handle diplomatic isolation, but economic isolation is fatal,” the president said. “We have to do something about it.”

This story, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here. (Foreground, right, hand raised, is me.)

One question I wanted to ask Ma, but couldn’t because my raised hand kept being ignored, was this: President Ma, you and your administration have repeatedly said that Taiwan must sign an ECFA with China because of regional economic integration. You claim that Taiwan does not have a choice. But the reason Taiwan does not have a choice is because China has now allowed other countries in the region to sign free-trade agreements with Taiwan. Granted, some of those countries, as you just said, told Taiwan they’d rather it sign an ECFA with China before they can consider negotiating an FTA with Taiwan, comments that nevertheless are an extension of Beijing’s diplomatic bullying. Taiwan should have a choice, but it doesn’t, and this is because of Chinese interference.

Now, how can we expect that Beijing will show “goodwill” toward Taiwan through an ECFA this time around? How do we know this is not a trap?

I intended to underscore my question with the following analogy, which though crude, in my view perfectly describes the situation: Beijing is like the village’s serial rapist who sees a poor young lady outside in the rain. First, it goes to the other villagers and tells them ‘You leave her alone and you do not allow her into your houses, or I’ll beat you up.’ He then goes over to the young lady and tells her ‘You are welcome to seek shelter into my house. Only after you’ve spent the night will I perhaps allow you to visit some neighbors.’

There is no doubt that Ma is a consummate dissembler and deflector, with an uncanny ability to take no position or to provide answers that can be interpreted in a number of ways to please everybody. Unfortunately, one glaring contradiction he made in one of his answers on Tuesday was not seized upon by the audience. After repeating that there is absolutely nothing political in an ECFA, he said that free-trade agreements not only concern matters of economics, but have “lots of political” aspects. How can an ECFA be apolitical when FTAs have “lots” of politics?

RSF inaugurates own ‘pavilion’ at Shanghai Expo

The Expo 2010 Shanghai slogan “Better city — Better life” is meaningless when a government imposes so many curbs on freedom of expression, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in a press release on Monday.

“‘City under surveillance — Lives under surveillance’ would be a better slogan for this World Expo in China,” the organization said.

Ahead of the official opening of the World Expo on Saturday, RSF has launched its own virtual pavilion named Garden of Freedoms.

The online “Garden of Freedoms” (en.rsf.org/shanghai _en.html), available in Simplified Chinese, French and English, is dedicated to freedom of expression and has a cyber-police pavilion, a Tibet pavilion and a “prisoners of conscience enclosure,” where visitors can sign petitions for their release.

“The ‘Garden of Freedoms’ will be the only place in the Shanghai World Expo where you will be able to discover the realities that the Chinese authorities go out of their way to hush up. Several dozen Shanghai human rights activists are currently under close police surveillance to prevent them from meeting the foreign journalists who will be covering the inauguration,” RSF said.

“A World Expo is meant to bring people together around such values as progress, humanism and culture,” it said. “What kind of universal values is China offering us when it jails such advocates of democracy as the intellectual Liu Xiaobo [劉曉波]? Why do the representatives of the democratic countries, including French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who will be at the inauguration, say nothing about China’s dark side?”

Two representatives of RSF — including secretary-general Jean-Francois Julliard — have been denied visas to visit Shanghai.

An official at the Chinese embassy in Paris told RSF that Beijing had instructed them to refuse the visas.

Asked by the Taipei Times if RSF expected Chinese hacker attacks on the site, Vincent Brossel, head of RSF’s Asia- Pacific desk, said that while they feared this was a possibility, nothing had happened since the “Garden of Freedoms” campaign was launched.

“The last hacking attack on the RSF Web site dates back to August 2008 and the site remains blocked [in China],” he said. “If an attack occurs, we hope our host will be able to assist us.”

This story was published today in the Taipei Times.

Book Review: The hidden hand of the CCP in Hong Kong

Ever since the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was founded in 1921, Hong Kong has consistently been regarded as a threat and opportunity by party leaders. First as a British colony until retrocession in 1997 and then as part of the “one country, two systems,” the CCP views the territory as a potential springboard from which foreign powers could undermine the authorities on the mainland.

Simultaneously, Hong Kong was the main platform where both the British and Chinese governments could conduct dialogue and, as 1997 approached, a source of much-needed capital and an instrument to test special administrative rule.

This, and much more, is the focus of former Hong Kong legislator Christine Loh’s (陸恭蕙) fascinating Underground Front: The Chinese Communist Party in Hong Kong. The amount of information contained in her well-researched book makes it an extremely useful tool to understand the CCP’s policies in Hong Kong.

Loh walks us through what she sees as the six main phases of CCP relations with Hong Kong: early Marxism in Hong Kong; the early years of CCP rule in China; the Cultural Revolution; the Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平) era; the post-Tiananmen Square Massacre era; and the first decade after retrocession.

Throughout this time — and even after Hong Kong became a special administrative region — we see the CCP acting as if it were a criminal organization forced to remain underground. Part of this, we learn, is the result of Maoism’s lack of mass appeal in Hong Kong, which since the Treaty of Nanjing in 1842 had been ideologically shaped by the British.

My review, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Tung, Ma, Article 23 and an ECFA

In its strategy for the unification of Taiwan and China, Beijing has not only been transparent about its intentions, it has also relied upon tactics that proved effective in the past.

After a lull in such efforts for the greater part of former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) administration, Beijing reignited its drive following the election of the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) as Taiwanese president.

Despite a series of agreements signed since Ma came into office in May 2008, by far the most consequential item in Beijing’s instruments of unification is the proposed economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA), which could be signed as early as late next month or in June.

In its approach for the trade deal, Beijing has acted in ways that are strikingly reminiscent of the process surrounding attempts to pass Article 23 of the Basic Law in Hong Kong. Both the content and the manner in which Beijing and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) authorities attempted to pass the bill were controversial. Among others, the bill contained provisions on national security that threatened to blur the lines between Hong Kong’s special semiautonomous status and that of China, and Beijing’s Liaison Office in the territory seriously underestimated the level of opposition to the proposed legislation.

This op-ed, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Activist accuses judiciary of perjury, wants investigation

Alliance of Referendum for Taiwan convener Tsay Ting-kuei (蔡丁貴) and his counsels on Thursday accused the judiciary of perjury and called for an investigation.

The allegation came in the wake of charges against Tsay following a protest at the Legislative Yuan on Sept. 8 last year, when he was alleged by police to have obstructed their work and thrown himself onto a vehicle.

In a police video, Tsay is seen being blocked by five police officers in front of the legislative building. At 4:08pm Tsay briefly collides with a vehicle driving through the legislature gates. Off balance as he seeks to avoid contact with police, his back and hand come into contact with the vehicle for less than a second, whereupon two officers pull him away.

Tsay and about 20 other people continued the protest and at 4:20pm he was bumped by another vehicle leaving the legislature, after which he was manhandled by police and a melee ensued. He was eventually taken away.

Tsay told a press conference on Tuesday that his intention that day was to petition the legislature to lower the threshold for referendums, but that dozens of police officers blocked his access to the building. The video corroborates his claim.

“They didn’t have a warrant and had no cause to take him in,” Tsay’s counsel Billy Chen Da-cheng (陳達成) told the Taipei Times on Thursday. “This is the Legislative Yuan. There’s no need to apply for a permit to be there.”

Chen said that while footage shot by police, as well as 64 pictures, was submitted to the court, the judge relied solely on witnesses — police officers, as well as the driver of the vehicle with which Tsay collided at 4:08pm — to support the charges.

This story, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Part I of the video can be viewed here.

Part II can be viewed here.

From American Scientist online: “Ting-Kuei Tsay received his Ph.D. from Cornell University and taught at Syracuse University before returning to Taiwan to teach at NTU. He holds a joint appointment as professor in the civil engineering department and senior research fellow at the Hydrotech Research Institute. He specializes in waterway, estuarine, embayment and coastal hydrodynamics.” Hardly the uneducated, troublemaking supporter of Taiwanese independence often portrayed by the KMT or Beijing ...

Group unveils pressure strategy to counter ECFA

Participants at a meeting of groups that oppose signing an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with China on Monday night agreed to follow an initiative to hold a rally against the proposed trade pact.

“For the time being, we will continue to support the Taiwan Solidarity Union’s [TSU] signature drive for an ECFA referendum,” Tsay Ting-kuei (蔡丁貴), convener of the Taiwan Referendum Alliance, told the Taipei Times yesterday.

“However, we think the first stage of the TSU to submit the petition signatures will come too late, as the date [for doing so] has been set for April 25,” he said.

Although Tsay said it would be nice to see the TSU petition for a referendum passed by the Central Election Committee and for the second stage of the petition process to begin, “we do not anticipate this will happen under the current atmosphere created by [President] Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration.”

“We are prepared to convey a proposal to the Democratic Progressive Party, which is expected to hold a rally against an ECFA on May 20, the second anniversary of Ma’s inauguration,” Tsay said. “Our proposal is that the rally request the Legislative Yuan and/or Ma to respond to a resolution for an ECFA referendum in accordance with the Referendum Act [公民投票法], rather than just dismiss the rally at the end of the day.”

Tsay said his group was prepared to apply continuous pressure on the legislature and the Ma administration by holding rallies of between 5,000 and 10,000 protesters a day around the legislature.

This article, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Attack helicopters’ delivery to Taiwan reportedly ‘on track’

A US$2.5 billion contract to sell 30 AH-64D Apache Longbow attack helicopters to the Taiwanese Army, sent to US Congress in October 2008 for approval, is on schedule, Defense News reported on Monday.

Since the notification, and especially in the wake of the announcement of a US$6.4 billion US arms sale to Taiwan earlier this year, there had been speculation that Beijing would pressure Boeing Co, the manufacturer of the AH-64, into canceling the deal.

Boeing, which merged with McDonnell Douglas in 1997, was among the US firms singled out by Beijing as facing potential retaliatory sanctions for participating in the deal. It also sold Taiwan US$37 million in Harpoon training missiles.

A letter of offer and acceptance was signed last year between Taipei and Washington and a joint US government- Boeing team is expected to visit Taipei in the middle of next month to finalize the deal, the magazine reported, citing sources in the Taiwanese and US defense industries.

The helicopters are armed with Stinger air-to-air missiles and AGM-114L Longbow Hellfire missiles and are part of efforts by the Taiwanese Army to modernize its aviation capabilities.

US-Taiwan Business Council president Rupert Hammond-Chambers told Defense News there was no reason to “believe that the first of the Apaches won’t start arriving [in] late 2012 [or] early 2013 as ordered.”

“While China’s position on arms sales [to Taiwan] is well-known, the position of all contracting parties is this is a government-to-government sale ... [and] therefore there is no reason to believe that Boeing would not follow through on a transaction/order from the US Army irrespective of any pressure China may try to bring,” he said.

While Hammond-Chambers said he was unaware of pressure from Beijing regarding the helicopter sale, a local US defense industry source told Defense News that “I can ... guarantee that Boeing is getting heat in Beijing.”

In September last year, Boeing said China would require 3,770 new airplanes valued at about US$400 billion over the next 20 years. Boeing and its European rival Airbus are vying for a share of that market.

This story appreared today in the Taipei Times.

SFC confirms Nan Shan bidder irregularities

Information found on the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) Web site yesterday confirmed that three individuals who own shares in a Hong Kong-based investment company bidding for Nan Shan Life Insurance Co (南山人壽) have committed irregularities in recent years.

In a March 31 story, the Taipei Times quoted a report from the office of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Pan Meng-an (潘孟安) that alleged current shareholders at China Strategic Holdings Ltd (中策集團) — part of a consortium bidding for Nan Shan — included two Hong Kong stock traders who were fined by the SFC for “rampant speculation” and another who was indicted by the commission, also for speculation.

The three individuals are:

Ren Dezhang (任德章, Cantonese: Yam Tak Cheung), a Hong Kong stock trader who was fined by the SFC for speculation. He holds HK$400 million (US$51.5 million) in bonds and a 5.1 percent share of China Strategic.

In the “Successful prosecutions — disclosure of interests” of its annual 2007-2008 report, the SFC lists Ren as being convicted on April 26, 2007, and fined HK$1,500 plus HK$6,000 for investigation costs.

Zhen Zhiping (甄志平, Cantonese: Yan Chi Ping ) a Hong Kong stock trader, was sanctioned by the SFC for speculation in 2002. He holds HK$120 million in bonds and a 1.5 percent share of China Strategic.

Documents provided by the SFC show that Zhen was suspended for four months from Nov. 18, 2005, to March 17, 2006, for deceiving his employer, Get Nice Investment Ltd (結好投資).

“An SFC investigation found that Yan [Zhen] had acted dishonestly in conducting his own securities trading, without his employer knowing, through an account opened in the name of his friend, and in the process, earning bonuses from his employer to which he was not entitled,” the document says.

Through trading in his friend’s account between January 2002 and March 2003, Zhen received about HK$260,000 in bonuses.

The SFC said Zhen was guilty of misconduct and his fitness and probity were called into question.

Gu Baoshun (谷保順, Cantonese: Kuk Po Shun), a Hong Kong stock speculator, was indicted by the SFC for speculation in 2004 and later confessed. He holds HK$107 million in bonds and a 1.4 percent share of China Strategic.

In a Nov. 25, 2004, press release entitled “Failure to disclose interests results in prosecution,” the SFC reported that “Kuk Po Shun [Gu] pleaded guilty to breaching Part XV of the Securities and Futures Ordinance by failing to disclose, to HKEx and FT Holdings International Ltd (星采控股), his interests in shares in FT Holdings and his subsequent reduction in those interests.” Gu was fined HK$10,000 and ordered to pay the SFC’s investigation costs.

In October, a consortium formed by China Strategic and Primus Financial Holdings Ltd (博智金控) reached an agreement with American International Group Inc to acquire the US company’s 97.57 percent stake in Nan Shan for USS$2.15 billion.

However, concerns have since mounted in Taiwan over whether the consortium is backed by Chinese money and if major shareholders in the consortium are qualified to own shares in a Taiwanese insurance firm, given the above list of activities, including forgery, perjury, embezzlement and breach of trust.

This recently became a subject of dispute as the Insurance Act (保險法) does not specify criteria for reviewing shareholder eligibility or define the term “major shareholders.” Taiwan’s Financial Supervisory Commission said in February that it was working on amendments to the Act, which it hoped the Cabinet would approve in time for the review of the Nan Shan case.

Meanwhile, checks with Canadian intelligence could not confirm speculation, reported in the China Times on Oct. 21 last year, that Shandong-born Xiao Jianhua (肖建華), a Chinese stock trader who is allegedly leading the bid for Nan Shan, is in Canada. In its report, Pan’s office alleged that Xiao is on the run following involvement in two cases of stock speculation and insider trading, including Zhejiang Financial Holdings and Pacific Security.

This article was published today in the Taipei Times.

In terms of the investors/shareholders being eligible to take over Nan Shan, the information in this story has no direct bearing on the case, as there is nothing in the legal system that bars investors with a shady record from doing so. Only board members at a company established here in Taiwan — e.g., the Primus Nan Shan Holdings that would rear it ugly head should the deal be approved — with a criminal record would be disqualified. What Taiwan is now trying to change, as a direct consequence of the Nan Shan bid, is to make it more difficult for investors with no experience in insurance to acquire insurance companies. Whether this will be approved by Cabinet remains to be seen, but I am told the motion is getting support from both sides of the aisle.

The above piece was meant more as a follow-up to my initial lead on the matter, as well as to show the kind of people (not exactly kosher) who are involved in the deal. In my view, this should weigh on a decision whether to allow the takeover to materialize or not — especially when well-known underworld figures like Xiao Jianhua are involved.

Yahoo e-mail accounts hacked

Reporters operating in Taiwan were among a number of journalists and rights activists whose e-mail accounts were compromised in what appears to have been a coordinated series of attacks uncovered this week. The development comes on the heels of an announcement by Google that it was moving its Chinese-language search service out of China over censorship concerns.

The problems began last Thursday, when some journalists in Taiwan and China found they were unable to access their Yahoo e-mail accounts.

One Taiwan-based target of the apparent attack told the Taipei Times on Monday that his e-mail account had been “hacked” the previous Wednesday or Thursday, adding that his passwords were changed.

The Taipei Times has since learned that two of its former employees, who still work in the news industry, were among those targeted.

“When I first tried to log onto my account and was denied I got a message that said: ‘Important Message About Your Yahoo! Account. We have detected an issue with your account. To access your account, you must contact Yahoo! Customer Care,’” the journalist told the Taipei Times on condition of anonymity for fear of being the target of renewed attacks.

“They then misspelled the US as ‘Unites States,’ which concerned me because I know that Chinese hackers sometimes send fake messages like this and often misspell words,” he said.

“It was Yahoo that decided to shut down accounts that were being targeted. They [hackers] were poking around Yahoo looking at our account information. Someone in Yahoo raised the red flag and they locked the accounts down,” the reporter said.

“Despite the fact that Yahoo is getting some criticism for not being secure enough ... I think it’s fair to say they were wise enough to protect their customers from an attack. But they should explain it further. There were too many of us who were hit to write it off as a coincidence,” he said.

“It is evident that whomever was behind the attacks, whether government or individuals, it originated most likely in China,” he said.

A current employee at the Taipei Times received a similar warning last Friday, informing her that there were signs of “unauthorized access” in her account, which could only be reactivated on Tuesday after a verification telephone call and change of passwords. Yahoo apologized to the user for the delay, saying it had received “unusually high volumes” of alerts.

Continues here.

PLA modernization and the implications for Taiwan

Earlier today, Jason Miks, an editor at the Australia-based magazine The Diplomat, asked me to comment on US Admiral Robert Willard’s remarks last week on the pace of Chinese military modernization and its implication for Taiwanese security. Part of my comments appeared in his entry here. What follows is what I provided Mr. Miks with in its entirety.

US Admiral Robert Willard’s comments are nothing new. China is a rising power and power projection is part of that, as has occurred with other rising powers in the past.

What’s more difficult to rationalize, however, is how little attention Beijing seems to be paying to the message that this sends at a time when the region, the US and especially Taiwan are increasingly concerned about China in terms of its ability to act as a responsible stakeholder. The Google case, disputes over trade and possible currency manipulation (among others), have only exacerbated those fears.

From a Taiwan perspective, every sign of modernization and build-up undermines President Ma Ying-jeou’s efforts to sell his cross-strait policy of détente. It makes it increasingly difficult for him to say, with a straight face, that Nature, not the People’s Republic of China (PRC), is now Taiwan’s No. 1 enemy, a comment he made not long after the Typhoon Morakot disaster in southern Taiwan in August last year.

Also worrying — and I’ve written about this before — is the fact that growing cultural and business exchanges are making it easier for China to spy on Taiwan, which, coupled with increasingly modern capabilities, would make it easier for the People’s Liberation Army to identify key targets, or even engage in sabotage in Taiwan prior to a military strike.

There is no doubt that Taiwan’s defense apparatus has lost its edge over China, especially since the Ma administration has advocated a more “peaceful” approach toward the PRC by being less “provocative” and holding fewer — and smaller — military exercises simulating a Chinese invasion. The Taiwanese military is therefore less prepared, at a time when the People’s Liberation Army is becoming stronger. This shows us that while Ma and his advisers may believe in the benefits of their policy of détente vis-à-vis China, Beijing wants to keep all its options open and to be ready if the necessary option turns out to be force.

Of course, Beijing and security experts have made the case that the modernization of the PLA is not solely aimed at Taiwan, and to a certain extent that’s true. Submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBM), for example, or the SA-20 PMU-2 missile defense system it has purchased from Russia to defend key areas like cities and the Three Gorges Dam, for example, have applications that go beyond a Taiwan contingency. But the problem, from Taiwan’s perspective, is that all those systems also have applications in a Taiwan contingency. In other words, even dual-use systems that can be rationalized as being part of the natural growth of a rising power can apply to a Taiwan scenario. True, the village bully could use his brand new baseball bat to play baseball, but given his tendencies, can we entirely ignore the possibility that he could use that same item to beat neighboring weaklings with it?

Lastly, China could be using military expansion to send a political signal to Washington: As long as you keep selling weapons to Taiwan, we’ll continue expanding (it’s no coincidence that China successfully tested a missile defense system just as the US was about to announce the US$6.4 billion arms package to Taiwan, which includes the PAC-3 missile defense system). This growth could also be used as a means to signal that the cost to US intervention in a Taiwan scenario would be such that Washington should think twice about coming to Taiwan’s assistance; in other words, with each addition to its offensive system (and provided the US does not increase its own forces in the region), the cost-benefit analysts for decision-makers in Washington regarding the entry into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait becomes increasingly in favor of non-intervention. If you look at those systems, many are intended as “area denial” weapons, which would force US deployments to stay further away from the Taiwan Strait, while others are now capable of targeting US bases in places like Okinawa, which also has serious implications for the risk to US forces in the region and could accelerate moves to relocate those forces further away, such as in Guam, which would add to the deployment time should the US need to come to Taiwan’s assistance.

PRC hand seen in Nan Shan bid: report

An electronic copy of a report obtained by the Taipei Times on the yet-to-be-approved sale of Nan Shan Life Insurance Co claims that the backers of the Hong Kong-based consortium led by Primus Financial Holding Ltd and China Strategic Holding may include individuals found guilty of financial irregularities as well as close relatives of senior members of the Chinese Communist Party.

The English translation of the report, which is dated March 10 and comes from the office of Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Pan Meng-an (潘孟安), also mentions risks of stock speculation and raises questions about the qualifications of major shareholders and the use of “shell” companies.

Pan's office told the Taipei Times yesterday the report drew from newspapers, magazines and investors in Hong Kong. The office confirmed the report received “government help,” but would not specify which agency or agencies were involved.

This lead front-page story was published today in the Taipei Times, and continues here. A Chinese-language version of this article appeared in Taiwan Tribune on April 30.

The context for Ma’s death threats

There is not an ounce of doubt that in any respectable society, freedom of expression ends at the shore of hate speech or incitement of violence. While freedom of expression is a precious resource that, even to this day, is still denied to far too many people around the world, the liberties that it confers upon people should not be exploited in a manner that undermines the very foundations of freedom.

In this light, recent comments posted by netizens calling for the assassination of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and his daughters, as well as Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶), deserve full condemnation and should be investigated in full. Decades ago, Taiwan shed its violent past — true, one in which the state visited violence upon its people — and it would be most unfortunate if such practices became the norm once again.

That said, attempts on Monday by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Chang Hsien-yao (張顯耀) to portray the assassination threats as the result of “perennial ethnic tensions” incited by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) completely miss the mark and negate the context in which the threats were made.

This op-ed, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

The ins and outs of the latest US arms package to Taiwan

In late January, the US Department of Defense’s Defense Security Cooperation Agency announced the approval of a major arms package to Taiwan. Included in the US$6.4 billion deal were PAC-3 missile defense systems and associated equipment, UH-60M Blackhawk helicopters, Osprey-class mine-hunting ships, work on command-and-control systems, and Harpoon training missiles. Also in the pipeline are P3-C Orion maritime patrol aircraft.

While Beijing has reacted with anger at news of the sale, threatening economic sanctions against the US defense companies involved, the Taipei Times takes a closer look at each item and its capabilities. To cap things off, we look at what’s missing — and desirable.

This feature, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.

Tibetans convicted for sending information abroad

Since the unrest in Tibet in March 2008, as many as 50 Tibetans have been arrested for sending reports, photos or videos abroad, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said in a report on Monday. In some cases, those arrests resulted in long jail sentences, it said.

The latest conviction, the group said. Involved a netizen called “Dasher” who received a 10-year prison sentence on charges of “separatism” for sending reports and photos of the protests.

“The repression has never stopped since the March 2008 uprising in the Tibetan regions,” RSF said. “This persecution of Tibetans who take risks to send evidence of the human situation abroad is a tragic illustration of the state of exception that reigns in Tibet. We call for their immediate release.”

Dasher, who was arrested on March 13, 2008, was convicted and sentenced by an intermediate court in Lhasa late last month, meaning that two years had elapsed between his detention and trial. The exact date of his trial is not known. He is being held in Lhasa’s Chushur prison, the group said.

RSF’s claims that at least 50 Tibetans have been arrested for sending information out of China have been verified by the India-based Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy. Most of the material was sent via Internet, which is closely monitored by Chinese authorities, RSF said.

Another detainee, Tashi, is a 24-year-old Tibetan from Rata, eastern Tibet, who was arrested in the middle of last month. A Tibetan from the same village told RSF he was accused of “having contact with people abroad and watching political videos online.” He is being held in Nagchu district.

In Sog, Gyaltsing was sentenced to three years in prison in December on charges of “communicating information to contacts outside China” after downloading pictures of exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama. While he is allowed to receive family visits, he is interrogated every week and is often given beatings, RSF said.

Tibetan journalists allege that a re-education campaign in Sog has resulted in the arrest of several Tibetans who refused to comply with the “Love your religion, love your country” campaign, RSF said.

Asked for comment, Taiwan Friends of Tibet chairwoman Chow Mei-li (周美里) told the Taipei Times last night that this shows that the situation in Tibet remains critical.

“The Chinese Internet police monitors content. Now we know they go further — by sentencing. This is a violation of human rights,” she said.

“As cross-strait relations become closer,” Chow said, “the Taiwanese government should use every opportunity to protest such activities by the Chinese government.”

For all we know, Taiwanese citizens and their Internet use could also be monitored.

Asked if the Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) administration was likely to criticize Beijing for the repression unveiled on the RSF report, Chow said “it probably won’t.”

A shorter version of this article appeared today in the Taipei Times.

Interview with Cambodian genocide survivor Loung Ung

At the invitation of the Parent Teacher Association at Taipei American School, Cambodian activist Loung Ung, author of First They Killed My Father and Lucky Child, was in Taipei last week to talk about her personal experiences as a child under the Khmer Rouge. She sat down with Taipei Times staff reporter J. Michael Cole on Wednesday to talk about history, trauma and reconciliation.

Taipei Times (TT): Talking about the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) — better known as the “Khmer Rouge Tribunal” — some people have argued that we need prosecution before we can reach the point of true forgiveness for the 2 million people who were massacred in the genocide. Do you agree with this view?

Loung Ung: What’s true forgiveness? Is that even possible? All these standards and all these arguments from people with feelings of justice and true forgiveness, this is verbiage that really isn’t going to be possible. Whether it’s the ECCC or the tribunal, truth and reconciliation or the ICC [International Criminal Court], I don’t think we’re ever going to be able to find a method to give Cambodians true justice and true forgiveness.

It really is about education. This is an opportunity to centralize information and to use it as a tool to educate the next generation. [Cambodian genocide researcher] Khamboly Dy just came out with the historical textbook of the Khmer Rouge era. That was only two years ago and it is now being used in school. When I was at the tribunal last year on Feb. 17 — the opening of the tribunal — I was talking with students who didn’t know anything that was going on.

My full interview with Loung Ung continues here.

Google China unblocks sensitive keyword results

US media reported on Tuesday that search engine Google was rumored to have lifted restrictions on its Chinese search engine at www.google.cn.

“Web sites dealing with subjects such as the Tiananmen Square democracy protests, Tibet and regional independence movements” could be searched and accessed through Google.cn, the Epoch Times newspaper quoted MSNBC as saying.

NBC said that while search results were “erratic” and access to certain Web sites was occasionally denied, the improvement from just six months ago was nevertheless significant.

Performing searches using keywords such as the Tiananmen Square Massacre, the Times said that some photos and related material were accessible.

A search for “Falun Gong” — the spiritual group with ties to the Times — resulted in one image of anti-torture exhibits held by Falun Gong adherents, the Times said. While official Falun Gong Web sites did not show up in search results, a link to Tian Ti Books, which sells Falun Gong books, showed up at the top of the search results, the paper said.

Most of the keywords were in Chinese, the Times said.

Searches conducted by the Taipei Times last night revealed that English searches for Falun Gong returned results for Tian Ti Books, the English Wikipedia page on the organization, various videos and the Web page of the Falun Dafa in Singapore. Searches using Chinese keywords were not as successful, while searches for the Tiananmen Square Massacre or “Incident” in Chinese and English appeared to be censored again.

Searches for key student leaders during the Massacre, including Wang Dan (王丹), provided some results, including a picture of him standing in front of a board reading “Taiwan Foundation for Democracy.” Searches for Taiwanese independence, using both Chinese and English keywords, yielded several results, including blogs.

This story appeared today in the Taipei Times.

What's equally interesting — but was cut from my story, for some reason — is the fact that a Google spokesman on Tuesday denied that Google had stopped censoring search results. What's going on there, an internal battle? 

Reaching out

This morning I attended the “Gaining International Support, Accelerate Taiwan’s Nation Building” conference organized by the World Taiwanese Congress at National Taiwan University Hospital’s convention center in Taipei. With guest speakers including former US diplomat John Tkacik and Nakajima Mineo, and opening remarks by Democratic Progressive Party Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu (陳菊), I had reasons to hope that the conference would provide new ideas to help Taiwan break out of its isolation and fend off Chinese encroachment.

Turnout was good, with perhaps 100 people showing up. The great majority of them, as always, were elderly Taiwanese, with perhaps 10 percent of attendees below the age of 40. Aside from Tkacik, the only foreigners in the audience were Austin University’s Donald Rogers, American writer Jerome Keating, Monash University’s Bruce Jacobs, and myself. Several Taiwanese-Americans or US-based Taiwanese were in attendance. Media coverage appeared to be limited to Public Television Service, which took some footage of Tsai and Chen.

After brief opening remarks — all in Taiyu, with the exception of Tsai’s, which were a mix of Mandarin and Taiyu — Tkacik gave his presentation, using both English and Mandarin, focusing mostly on history and providing as few anecdotes (by that time, Tsai and Chen had already left). This was followed by a brief question-and-answer session, which, like Tkacik’s presentation, didn’t yield anything groundbreaking. After a short break, Nakajima took the podium and delivered a speech in Japanese, with translation in Taiyu. After about 20 minutes of this, nearly one third of the audience was fast asleep, text messaging on their cell phones or, as Jacobs did to my right, reading newspapers. Nakajima was telling us that China and the US had entered a new cold war and that the turning point was the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989.

By 12:10, Don, Bruce and I had had enough and called it quits. Not before noting, however, that if such conferences can’t manage to captivate people who, like us, are interested about Taiwan and care about its fate, then there’s no way they will attract younger generations of Taiwanese upon whom the future of this nation depends. As I’ve mentioned before through my observations of demonstrations, I find it disheartening that there are so few young Taiwanese participating in political events that will affect the fate of their country. If the current leadership sticks to geriatric events such as the one I attended today, however, there’s very little hope younger Taiwanese will get involved. Putting them to sleep on a Saturday after a long week at school or at work won’t do it.

And for an event that supposedly focuses on gaining international support for Taiwan, focusing on the past, rehashing the same platitudes over and over again — and doing this in a language that next to no foreigners understand (with no simultaneous interpretation at hand) — will hardly make that come true.

The intentions were good, undoubtedly, and there were lots of good people in the room. But it was disappointing and somewhat depressing. At some point the old leaders will have to pass on the torch and help awaken young minds to the cause. Discussing the future, using engaging venues and speakers, and making the whole effort energetic — that’s what Taiwan needs. Youth need to be brought in, not excluded, and the old guard must start listening to the younger generation, something to which, I am told, there is a lot of resistance in the Taiwanese-American community and, I’m sure, in Taiwan as well.

China shows signs of neo-fascism

With its strong emphasis on technology, the military, strong single-party leadership and a collective national identity that refuses to recognize pluralism, China is displaying increasing — and worrying — symptoms of fascism. From the military parade surrounding the 60th anniversary of the birth of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on Oct. 1 to forced relocation and assimilation programs targeting ethnic minority groups such as the Uighurs, China is in many ways reminding us of the fascist states that reared their ugly heads in the first half of the previous century.

In some ways, it is difficult to apply that term to the rising dragon, primarily because of some marked differences from its predecessors. For one, fascist states tended to be short-lived and led by strong — and often charismatic — rulers. China, even if we take 1949 as its starting point, has a long history and its leaders, with the possible exception of former premier Zhou Enlai (周恩來), are not known for their charisma.

China’s embrace of capitalism in the early 1990s has also masked its fascistic tendencies, because “unrestrained capitalism” was one of the principal targets of fascism. The fact that the PRC finds its roots in communism and class conflict — both of which fascism traditionally opposed — can also mislead the observer.

Still, today’s China arguably represents fascism 2.0, neo- fascism or “fascism with Chinese characteristics.”

One of the most peremptory signs of fascism is the state’s negation of individualism and the idea that citizens draw their identity and raison d’etre from the state. Evidence of this emerged earlier this week when Chinese Vice Sports Minister Yu Zaiqing (于再清) chided 18-year-old Olympic champion short track speedskater Zhou Yang (周洋) for thanking her parents — but not her country — after winning gold at the Vancouver Winter Games last month.

“It’s OK to thank your parents, but first you should thank the motherland. You should put the motherland first, not only thank your parents,” Yu told the Southern Metropolis Daily.

This article, published today in the Taipei Times, continues here.