Taiwan using executions to boost approval rating: protesters

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2014-05-01

Members of the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty protest before
the Ministry of Justice on Tuesday. (Photo/Wang Chin-ho)

Protesters against the death penalty held a 40-strong rally in front of Taiwan's Ministry of Justice on Tuesday evening after the country executed five death-row inmates. The protesters said the government used the execution to boost its approval rating, which has plunged amid recent demonstrations against its handling of a trade pact with China and the country's fourth nuclear plant, reports the country's Central New Agency.

Protesters from the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty believe that the execution of the five inmates — Tai Wen-ching, Teng Kuo-liang, Liu Yen-kuo, Tu Ming-hsiung and Tu Ming-lang — reveals the government's dictatorial leanings.

Wang Wei-chun, director-general of Taiwan Children's Rights Association and with a nephew that was a victim of child abuse, accused the group of disregarding the feeling of the victims' families after getting into an argument with the group.

Lin Hsin-yi, the group's executive director, argued that Tu Ming-lang and Tu Ming-hsiung, brothers who were executed, were initially found innocent before being sentenced to the death penalty in subsequent retrials.

The executions were carried out in Taipei, Taichung, Tainan and Hualien by firing squad. There are 47 inmates on death row in the country after the latest round of executions. Two of the cases are set to be retried. The previous round of executions was conducted on April 19 last year when six convicted inmates were executed.

The five executed on Tuesday were convicted of 11 separate murders. Tai was found guilty of killing a taxi driver in 2002 and responsible for another murder. Liu killed a police officer during robbery in 1997. Teng drowned a woman and her son in 2009 over a money dispute while the Tu brothers was given the death sentence for killing two Taiwanese nationals and three Chinese nationals in Guangdong in 2001.

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