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Nov 13, 2008

... tails this time.

I posted yesterday on the rhetorical overboard we're now seeing from the Green side as everyone rushes to defend those arrested, especially President Chen. Now for the other side of the coin.

As pretty much everyone in the blogosphere has pointed out recently, the problem isn't that Chen is going to be prosecuted on corruption-related charges. I believe at the end of the day, the trial will be transparent and the evidence should be able to speak for itself.

  • Complete lack of due process, with many of the people rounded up being held incommunicado and without charges, including President Chen himself. Chen was in fact being held the night before the prosecutors even had the court approve holding him incommunicado. This is really the most important of all; due process is too vital to be shoved aside in so many cases.
  • The unevenness of investigations and arrests. It's not just that those arrested have all been higher-level greens; it's that even those blues who are already proven guilty aren't being put in jail, while there's also apparently no investigations going on for Blue country administrators (when we all know they're in one of the best positions to take bribes).
  • The "trial by media" occuring as prosecutors and the government leak information to the press, as well as the denial of any possible political motive (Ma himself called his prosecution political back in the day, and is denying that now as well as saying Chen is 'irresponsible' for making such statements).

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