3/20/2014
Department of International Affairs - Democratic Progressive Party
March 20 – The DPP held an international
press conference today, sending an ultimatum to President Ma Ying-jeou and warning
that this will be the last draw the DPP is withstanding ways the KMT
administration is forcing the passage of the Cross Strait Services Trade
Agreement.
Chair
Su: the DPP is not against free trade with China
DPP Chair Su Tseng-chang, as leader of the
party, stressed to the international media that the DPP is not against free
trade with China, a label that the KMT keeps repeating as a smear tactic.
While preparing for the supposed item by
item review and deliberation of the agreement, the DPP had issued four
standpoints, which were: (1) equal opening, (2) fair competition, (3)
safeguarding the people’s livelihood and (4) ensuring national security. The
DPP had made this clear to the KMT hoping that they would stick to the promises
made on June 25th of last year.
DPP
will stand by student groups protesting in parliament
From the beginning, the way the KMT
conducted the negotiations were extremely secretive and non-transparent. This
week, the KMT Legislative Caucus through its chairman of the committee in
charge of deliberation, Mr. Chang Ching-chung, announced in three seconds that
the agreement would move immediately to the plenary. Because of such decision, student
groups, professors and people from all circles of life decided to take on to the streets and express their dissatisfaction. They have also
barricaded themselves in parliament and some have vowed to go on hunger strike
until the government changes its stance.
“This is a key moment for me and my party
to improve our democracy,” Chair Su said.
Chair Su reported that international media
has widely covered this issue, some saying that Taiwan is facing a challenge to
its democracy with titles such as “Dead or Reborn” to characterize Taiwan’s
current situation. He said that just as in the past, Taiwan had to resort to
sit-ins outside parliament in order to achieve our democratic achievements, but
this is the first time that student groups in Taiwan have taken control of
parliament. He said that the students now represent a shield to our democracy
by blocking the Ma’s administration use of authoritarian methods to force on us
a trade agreement with China.
Chair Su expressed his appreciation to the
support of international friends, who like in the past, had issued their
condemnation of the KMT government’s suppressing actions. Now, they are once
again standing out to protect Taiwan’s democracy.
Holding a picture of students holding a
large sign that read “[a] 9% President Ma forced the parliament to pass [the]
Cross-Strait Agreement on Trade in Services within 3 seconds”, Chair Su said that
this is the result of his China-inclined policy, a term he said was labeled by
the international media on the Ma administration.
Next
steps: DPP will mobilize the entire country to support student groups
Chair Su said the next steps for the DPP
will be to mobilize more people from across the nation to surround parliament
in support of the students’ demands. He said that the DPP yesterday, through
its Central Standing Committee statement, had also made three demands to
President Ma:
1)
President Ma must immediately
apologize and promise not to commit this mistake again;
2)
The KMT must respect the
negotiation procedure at the Legislative Yuan, in which a deal was made between
the KMT and the opposition parties, and according to their initial promises of
reviewing the agreement item by item, they must immediately now fully agree to
renegotiate the agreement.
3)
The police must absolutely not
take any violent action against student groups expressing their opinions and
ensure for their protection and safety.
