Acknowledging the damage to his presidency and to the cause of Taiwanese independence from China, as well as the disappointment felt by many of his followers, Chen apologized both to the Democratic Progressive Party and to inhabitants of the self-ruled island in general. (emphasis added)Did I miss something? Did Chen mention the cause of Taiwanese independence from China in his speech? I can't find anything about it in this Chinese transcript, either.
It doesn't surprise me that the Post would misrepresent Chen's speech in this way, though. As Tim mentioned, they got all bent out of shape over Chen's use of Taiwanese. (So did the other Post, which accused Chen of "ignor[ing] the foreign journalists and most TV audience to use mostly the southern Fujianese dialect (prevalent in a southern China district) to cater his remarks to his own supporters in southern Taiwan" (emphasis added). I think the words they use to describe Taiwanese are quite... ummm... interesting. They're really emphasizing the mainland-Chineseness of the Taiwanese language, aren't they? I'll agree, though, that Chen was speaking more to his supporters than to anyone else...)
2 comments:
Hahahaha. I think he got his info from Jane Rickards, who was with the China Post until recently.
Michael
Thanks for the summary of the Financial Times interview--I saw that interview on the President's website, but didn't read it.
I was referring to Chen's television address of Nov. 5 and the Washington Post's coverage of that address. My concern is not whether or not Chen is pro-independence; I wanted to point out an inaccuracy in the Post report that I think reflects a tendency in the Western news media to paint everything about Chen in terms of the issue of Taiwanese independence.
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