Hundreds of thousands of “black-clad army” members took to the streets in Taipei yesterday, wearing black to symbolize what they call the government’s “black-box,” or opaque, handling of the cross-strait service trade pact as they called for the agreement to be retracted and Taiwan’s democracy to be safeguarded.

The demonstrators also wore yellow ribbons that read: “Oppose the service pact, save Taiwan” and chanted slogans such as “Protect our democracy, withdraw the trade deal” as they carried sunflowers, which became a symbol of opposition to the trade deal after the media dubbed the student-led protests the “Sunflower student movement.”