Monday, May 25, 2015

Political protests at Taipei 101

Because it's a popular attraction with mainland Chinese tourists, Taipei 101 attracts a range of political protestors, among them Falun Gong practitioners and advocates of Taiwan independence. This man, who I met a couple of months ago, was demonstrating in support of an intriguing but much derided and utterly impractical idea. According to him and the likes of Roger C.S. Lin, Taiwan should be under US military administration, because the 1952 Treaty of San Francisco did not specify who should take control of the island once Japan had renounced all rights to it. Lin filed a suit in US courts, seeking to force Washington to recognize its own rights and responsibilities regarding Taiwan. Even though the suit was dismissed by the Supreme Court in 2009, diehards haven't abandoned their campaign.