World
Taiwan grapples with divisive history as new president prepares for power
Taipei, Taiwan – Even as Taiwan prepares for the inauguration of its eighth president next week, it continues to struggle over the legacy of the island’s first president, Chiang Kai-shek.
To some, Chiang was the “generalissimo” who liberated the Taiwanese from the Japanese colonisers. To many others, he was the oppressor-in-chief who declared martial law and ushered in the period of White Terror that would last until 1992.
For decades, these duelling narratives have divided Taiwan’s society and a recent push for transitional justice only seems to have deepened the fault lines. Now, the division is raising concern about whether it might affect Taiwan’s ability to mount a unified defence against China, which has become increasingly assertive in its claim over the self-ruled island.
“There is a concern when push comes to shove if the civilians work well with the military to defend Taiwan,” said historian Dominic Meng-Hsuan Yang of the University of Missouri in the United States.
On February 28, 1947, Chiang’s newly-arrived Kuomintang (KMT) troops suppressed an uprising by Taiwan natives, killing as many as 28,000 people in what became known as the February 28 Incident. In the four-decade-long martial law era that followed, thousands more perished.
This traumatic history met its official reckoning in 2018, when the Taiwan government set up its Transitional Justice Commission modelled after truth and reconciliation initiatives in Africa, Latin America and North America to redress historical human rights abuses and other atrocities.
When the commission concluded in May 2022, however, advocates and observers said they had seen little truth and hardly any reconciliation.
Almost from the first days of the commission, the meting-out of transitional justice became politicised across the blue-versus-green demarcation that has long defined Taiwan’s sociopolitical landscape, with blue representing KMT supporters and green the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
A recently published anthology entitled Ethics of Historical Memory: From Transitional Justice to Overcoming the Past explains how the way Taiwanese remember the past shapes how they think about transitional justice. And as that recollection is determined by which camp they support, each champions their own version of Taiwan’s history.
“That’s why transitional justice seems so stagnant now,” explained Jimmy Chia-Shin Hsu, research professor at the legal research institute Academia Sinica who contributed to and edited the book. “Whatever truth it uncovers would be mired in the blue-green narrative.”
A non-partisan view, Hsu said, is to credit the DPP with codifying transitional justice and Lee Teng-hui, the first democratically elected KMT president, with breaking the taboo on broaching the February 28 Incident.
The past shaping the future
In February, Betty Wei attended the commemoration for the February 28 incident for the first time and listened intently to the oral history collected from the survivors. Wei, 30, said she wanted to learn more about what happened because her secondary school textbook had brushed over what many consider a watershed event in a few cryptic lines, and many of her contemporaries showed little interest.
“In recent years the voices pushing for transitional justice have grown muted,” Wei told Al Jazeera. “A lot of people in my generation think the scores are for previous generations to settle.”
In Taiwan, the past is never past, and rather it is fodder for new fights.
As the DPP gears up for an unprecedented third consecutive term, the unfinished business of removing the island’s remaining statues of Chiang has resurfaced as the latest front in what Yang, the historian, described to Al Jazeera as “this memory war”.
More than half of the initial 1,500 monuments have been taken down over the past two years, with the remaining statues mostly on military installations.
Yang argues that is because the top brass rose through the ranks under martial law and many still regard Chiang as their leader, warts and all. For them, toppling the statues would be an attack on their history.
The statues embody “the historical legacy the military wants to keep alive,” Yang said. “That’s a source of tension between the military and the DPP government.”
On the eve of William Lai Ching-te taking his oath as the island’s next president, Taiwanese will for the first time mark the “White Terror Memorial Day” on May 19, the day when martial law was declared in 1949.
While it is clear Taiwanese have promised to never forget, whom and how to forgive has become far murkier.
As the former chairman of the Taiwan Association for Truth and Reconciliation, the first NGO advocating for the cause, Cheng-Yi Huang lauded the government’s move to take over the KMT’s private archives in recent years but lamented there had been too little truth-seeking so far.
For example, under the February 28 Incident Disposition and Compensation Act, Huang said many have chosen to stay silent about their complicity because only victims get compensation.
However, Taiwan’s tumultuous history means the line between victim and victimiser is rarely clear-cut.
By digging into military archives, Yang has shed light on how Chinese were kidnapped and pressed into service by the KMT in the last years of the Chinese Civil War. Those who tried to flee were tortured and even murdered. And the native Taiwanese who rose up to resist KMT’s suppression were persecuted as communists.
“Under martial law, the military was seen as an arm of the dictatorship, but they were also victims of the dictator’s regime,” Yang told Al Jazeera. “The transitional justice movement has missed the opportunity to reconcile Taiwanese society with the military.”
To Hsu, Beijing’s belligerence demands Taiwanese of all stripes find a common cause.
“As we’re facing the threat from the Chinese Communist Party, it’s imperative that we unite in forging a collective future,” said Hsu, to a standing-room-only book talk during the Taipei International Book Exhibition in late February.
“And how we remember our past will shape this future of ours.”
Patrick Muldoon, an actor who starred in “Days of Our Lives” and “Melrose Place,” died on Sunday, his manager confirmed to Variety. He was 57.
From 1992 to 1995, Muldoon originated the role of Austin Reed on the daytime soap opera “Days of Our Lives.” He returned to the soap to reprise the role from 2011 to 2012.
He also had a recurring role as Jeffrey Hunter in the teen television series “Saved by the Bell” in 1991. Muldoon also starred on the primetime soap opera “Melrose Place” from 1995 to 1996, playing the villain Richard Hart.
In 1997, Muldoon played the role of Zander Barcalow in the film “Starship Troopers,” directed by Paul Verhoeven.
Muldoon was also an active producer, working on a slew of movies including “The Tribes of Palos Verdes,” “Arkansas,” “Marlowe,” “The Card Counter,” “The Dreadful” and “Riff Raff” through his Storyboard Productions. He was set to produce the upcoming feature “Kockroach,” starring Chris Hemsworth. Just two days ago, Muldoon posted on Instagram: “So excited to be a part of this amazing project KOCKROACH directed by Matt Ross starring Chris Hemsworth, Taron Edgerton, Zazzie Beetz and Alec Baldwin.” The production is currently filming in Australia.
His latest acting role was in “Dirty Hands,” a new crime thriller with Denise Richards and Michael Beach. The film is slated to be released later this month.
Muldoon is survived by his partner, Miriam Rothbart; parents Deanna and Patrick Muldoon, Sr.; sister and brother-in-law Shana and Ahmet Zappa, niece Halo and nephew Arrow Zappa.
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A strong earthquake took place off the northern coast of Japan Monday afternoon, prompting the Japan Meteorological Agency to put out a tsunami alert in the area.
The quake, registering a preliminary magnitude of 7.5, occurred off the coast of Sanriku in northern Japan at around 4:53 p.m. local time, at a depth of about 6 miles below the sea surface, the agency said.
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A television screen shows a news report on Japan Meteorological Agency’s tsunami warning, saying it expected tsunami waves of up to 3 meters (9.84 feet) to reach large coastal areas in northern Japan after an earthquake struck off the northeastern coast of Japan, in Tokyo, Japan April 20, 2026 (REUTERS/Issei Kato)
A tsunami of around 2.6 feet was identified at the Kuji port in the Iwate prefecture while a tsunami of 1.3 feet was recorded at a different port in the prefecture, the agency indicated.
The Iwate prefecture put out non-binding evacuation advisories for those living in 11 towns.
A tsunami of as high as 10 feet could strike the region, the agency indicated.
RUSSIAN VOLCANO ERUPTS FOR FIRST TIME IN CENTURIES AFTER MASSIVE EARTHQUAKE STRIKES KAMCHATKA PENINSULA
A policeman picks his way through the debris looking for bodies in Rikuzentakata, Iwate prefecture, on March 22, 2011, after the devastating March 11 earthquake and tsunami. (TORU YAMANAKA/AFP via Getty Images)
A powerful 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami in 2011 wreaked havoc in Japan, leaving over 22,000 dead and compelling nearly 500,000 people to flee their homes, most of them because of tsunami damage.
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In this satellite view, the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power plant after a massive earthquake and subsequent tsunami on March 14, 2011 in Futaba, Japan. (DigitalGlobe via Getty Images via Getty Images)
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Around 160,000 fled their residences due to radiation from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant — around 26,000 have not come back because they resettled somewhere else, their hometowns are still off-limits, or they harbor concerns regarding radiation.
The Associated Press contributed to this report
Bulgaria’s former President Rumen Radev, an EU critic who has called for renewing ties with Russia, hailed a “victory of hope” on Monday after his Progressive Bulgaria (PB) coalition topped the polls in Sunday’s election, the eighth such parliamentary vote in five years.
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Many voters see Radev, a former fighter pilot, as the only person capable of giving the corruption-plagued Balkan nation a fresh start.
The 62-year-old has presented himself as a defender of the lowest earners in the EU’s poorest country as he walks a tightrope on European issues.
He has hailed the benefits Bulgaria has reaped from EU membership while calling for dialogue with Russia as its full-scale invasion of Ukraine rages into a fifth year.
“Bulgaria is in a unique position, because we are the only EU member state that is both Slavic and Eastern Orthodox,” Radev, who was president for nine years, said recently.
“That should be used … and we really can be a very important link in this whole process, which I am sure will sooner or later begin, to restore relations with Russia,” he added.
Last year, as president, he called for a referendum on Bulgaria’s entry into the eurozone, saying the Balkan country was not ready to join. Yet his proposal failed and Sofia adopted the joint European currency on 1 January.
Radev has also slammed military aid to Ukraine and the EU, trying to turn its back on Russian oil and gas.
“Geographically, economically, in terms of resources and as a market, we need to rebuild those relations,” he insisted.
Raised fist
For sociologist Parvan Simeonov, Radev is hard to figure out, like many leaders in the region who, “depending on the visiting delegation, choose whether or not to fly the Ukrainian flag in the background.”
Radev insists he embodies distrust of the country’s elites and oligarchs, denying any links to them.
A graduate of the elite US Air War College, he later served as the head of the Bulgarian Air Force.
He entered politics in 2016 and later won a presidential election to the largely ceremonial post.
Born in 1963 in the southeastern town of Dimitrovgrad, the austere and reserved man lacks the polish of seasoned communicators.
When he vows to regulate public tenders through AI or to reform the much‑criticised judicial system, he sometimes gives the impression of reciting a memorised text.
Yet he won over some liberal pro-European voters when he openly supported protesters at anti-corruption rallies in 2020.
Radev walked out of the presidential palace with his fist raised to join the protests that ultimately toppled conservative Prime Minister Boyko Borissov a year later.
Radev was re‑elected head of state in 2021 with two-thirds of the vote.
Modest lifestyle
Late last year, Radev once again backed anti-corruption protesters, and when the last government resigned in December, he stepped down as president to run in the election.
Radev’s left-wing conservative movement, Progressive Bulgaria, brings together a plethora of figures including military officers, former socialist officials and athletes, and the union leader of the country’s main arms manufacturer, which has boomed from supplying Ukraine’s army.
Radev is campaigning to combat social inequalities and promote budgetary discipline without calling for radical change, said Simeonov.
His promises of a return to stability appeal to voters tired of facing election after election.
Married with two children and intensely patriotic, Radev also wooed voters with a modest lifestyle and his defence of what he calls family values.
A campaign video shot in a village shop that went viral showed Radev soothing the grocer, upset over rising prices and Bulgaria’s entry into the eurozone.
Political instability
Sunday’s election follows five years of near-permanent crisis in which no government has survived a full term.
Instead, the country has cycled through caretaker administrations, fragile coalitions and short-lived alliances that have often collapsed amid scandal.
Public trust has all but evaporated. Voter turnout, once a barometer of democratic engagement, has entered a state of chronic decline.
This prolonged instability has unfolded against a backdrop of deepening internal divisions and mounting external pressure.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has exposed a stark fault line running through both society and the political class, one that continues to define the national conversation.
And yet, paradoxically, Bulgaria has, in this same period, taken major steps forward in its European integration — joining Schengen and adopting the euro — often without a functioning government or even a passed state budget.
Meanwhile, delays in reforms have slowed access to EU recovery funds, raising the risk of losing billions.
More than 60% of the votes had been counted by Monday morning, according to the Central Electoral Commission, putting Radev’s PB in the lead with around 45%, an absolute majority of at least 132 seats in the 240-seat parliament.
The outcome of the election is set to not only shape Bulgaria’s domestic trajectory but will also be closely watched across the EU, as the bloc fears further instability in any of its member states.
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