Taipei Times
Date: Feb 12, 2017
By: Hsiao Ting-fang and Jonathan Chin / Staff reporter, with staff writer

The Chinese government should promote freedom and democracy at home before trying to commemorate the 228 Incident, 228 Memorial Foundation chairman Hsueh Hua-yuan (薛化元) said.

Huseh made the remarks on Wednesday last week in response to plans by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office to commemorate the 228 Incident’s 70th anniversary this year.

The 228 Incident refers to a massacre by the then-Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) regime that began on Feb. 28, 1947, when soldiers in Taipei opened fired on people demonstrating against the death of a civilian during a crackdown on unlicensed vendors by a Tobacco and Alcohol Monopoly Bureau agent.

The Incident triggered an nationwide insurgency against the government, which responded by ordering a military crackdown that killed between 10,000 and 30,000 people, many of whom were local elites, and imposed Martial Law from 1949 to 1989, which marked the White Terror period.    [FULL  STORY]