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May 5, 2009

Hopefully a non-issue

Chief Editor of the anti-CCP website China Comments JI Xiaofeng (紀曉峰) says that Taiwan intelligence contacted him asking about any plans of Tibetan and E. Turkistan independence advocates, who the intelligence agency imagines may protest China at the World Games in Kaohsiung and Deaflympics in Taipei this year.

Ji claims shock that Taiwanese intelligence would work with Beijing to crush such advocates, and Ji sees those activists having the same common enemy as Taiwan.

The National Security Bureau confirms that it gathers general information on terrorists and "groups or individuals who are known to protest at international events," but says it is in no way directly targeting the Tibetan or E. Turkistan independence advocates. They (rightly) label this sort of intelligence gathering a common practice of law enforcement bodies around the world.

Meanwhile the Ministry of Foreign affairs denies having heard anything about this, and the Ministry of Defence says this sort of thing is outside of the work they deal with.

I think Ji is telling the truth, sinec the NSB does try to gather that kind of information, and their disclaimer about looking at all kinds of groups is probably true too. The test is in if and how they are allowed to protest.

1 comment:

Tommy said...

I agree with you. I see nothing wrong with Taiwan's intelligence people wanting to know about what dissidents will be attending the games for security reasons as long as those dissidents are not discriminated against. The only worry is that the KMT government will want to suppress them to avoid pissing off the CCP.