No Justice, No True Peace
Every year, on October 24th, United Nations Day is celebrated all over the world to commemorate the anniversary of the formal creation of the United Nations through the 1945 Charter of the United Nations. Every year, people celebrate its anniversary as a reminder of the importance of peace, respect for justice and international law, human rights, and fundamental freedoms, among others.
This year marked the 76th anniversary of the United Nations. The members of Tai Ji Men Qigong Academy and the Action Alliance to Redress 1219 hosted an online forum titled “No Justice, No True Peace.” Three members of the Tai Ji Men Qigong Academy from different parts of the United States discussed a case that happened in Taiwan and how it violated the spirit of the United Nations Day – the fabricated Tai Ji Men case.
Chiao St. Charles from Michigan shared that she has been practicing Tai Ji Men qigong for 24 years, and her health has improved. She said that “in the past 24 years, Dr. Hong taught us yin and yang philosophy and traditional Chinese culture, and kept reminding us to make our lives meaningful. However, Tai Ji Men has been under prolonged 24 years of bitter winters because of a fabricated case initiated by Prosecutor Hou Kuan-jen and the Field Office. It is a false case, and they carried it out without investigation.” That violated human rights, and it should not have happened in a free and democratic country, she said. Despite the fact that Taiwan’s Supreme Court found Tai Ji Men innocent of tax evasion and all other charges, the National Taxation Bureau disregarded the judicial decision and illegally auctioned Tai Ji Men’s sacred land, she added.https://b4d3679deb64d57605a96e537bffb0da.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html
On March 31, 2009, Taiwan’s Legislative Yuan passed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) and on May 14 of the same year, the then President of Taiwan ratified them. On December 10, 2009, the “Implementation Act of the ICCPR and ICESCR” officially took effect in Taiwan. However, the case against Tai Ji Men has also violated these two covenants.
Vivian Chang from Washington, D.C. stated that the Tai Ji Men Qigong Academy was established in 1966, and prosecutor Hou Kuan-jen illegally prosecuted Tai Ji Men in the name of due to religious crackdowns. For 6 years (1991-1996), its leader, Dr. Hong, was taxed for the gifts given to him by his disciples as the National Taxation Bureau treated the gifts as tuition of a cram school. However, Taiwan’s martial arts menpai (similar to school) and tens of thousands of religious groups have never been taxed for accepting gifts of respect from their dizi (disciples). Giving gifts of respect to teachers is a traditional custom in the martial arts and religious world in Taiwan. Nevertheless, only the gifts of respect from Tai Ji Men members to Dr. Hong were deemed to be taxable as tuition fees by the National Taxation Bureau, which clearly violates Articles 2 and 26 of the ICCPR, Article 2 of the ICESCR, and Article 7 of the Constitution of Taiwan.
Coco Yeh from the San Francisco Bay Area also mentioned that the Tai Ji Men case is a case of persecution under the name of prosecution. On December 19, 1996, Prosecutor Hou Kuan-jen led hundreds of armed policemen and investigators to raid and search Tai Ji Men’s academies and members’ residences. Other tactics utilized that violated human rights included making a disciple disappear for a week without notifying her family and employer, threatening many other disciples, secretive and intimidating interrogations without notifying lawyers, accusing Dr. Hong of raising goblins, fabricating the tax evasion, organizing fake victims, interrogating Dr. Hong for merely a total of 29 minutes over the course of 117-day pre-trial detention, and mobilizing the media to announce the accusation of fraud even before the interrogation was finished.
Without justice and human rights, there can be no true democracy and no true peace. All the speakers urged the Taiwanese government to implement ICCPR and ICESCR, redress the Tai Ji Men case, return Tai Ji Men’s land, stop persecuting Tai Ji Men and other innocent people, and stop human rights abuses through unjust taxation. If you are interested in watching the forum, please click the link below https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XMVIw_5IYc