Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Ketagalan Foundation chairman Mark Chen speaks at a forum discussing the Democratic Progressive Party’s strategy for returning to power.
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times

Comparing the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) China policy under former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and the party’s current policy is hard because of the rapidly changing dynamics of international politics, but there is no doubt that cross-strait policy during the Chen era was more than “eight lost years,” as some say, DPP members and academics said yesterday.

“The years between 2000 and 2008 were not lost years, but eight legendary, glorious years,” You Ying-lung (游盈隆), deputy executive director of the DPP’s think tank, told a forum in Taipei.

The Ministry of National Defense and President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) are probably wondering why the death of late army corporal Hung Chung-chiu (洪仲丘) has become perhaps the single most important news event in Taiwan in the past month, ruffling feathers in every part of society and showing no signs of stopping.

One reason it raised a high degree of public attention was because people imagined themselves in one of the roles in Hung’s family — the son who died from institutional injustice, the heartbroken mother whose grief over the loss of a son was almost too much to bear, or the sister who was determined to find the truth behind her brother’s death and hold people accountable.