Want China Times
Date: 2015-08-24
By: CNA and Staff Reporter
A memorial service was held Sunday in Taiwan’s outlying island county of Kinmen to
Veterans attend the memorial event in Kinmen, Aug. 23. (Photo/Li Chin-sheng)
mark the 57th anniversary of the beginning of a sustained period of artillery bombardment from mainland China in 1958.
The service, organized by the Kinmen Defense Command, was attended by more than 70 retired soldiers in honor of their fellow servicemen who died defending the outlying island from Chinese invasion during the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis.
Lee Jing-chuan, who lives in Pingtung county’s Wandan township and has set up an exhibition there of the battle, said withstanding the bombardment paved the way for the peace that now exists in Taiwan. He said Aug. 23 should be celebrated as “Peace Memorial Day of the Taiwan Strait.”
From Aug. 23, 1958, Chinese troops fired more than 470,000 shells at the 150-square-kilometer Kinmen island — which lies only a short distance from the Chinese mainland — over a period of 44 days, killing 587 ROC soldiers and 101 civilians. [FULL STORY]
