Mainland envoy in Taiwan attacked by independence activist mob

The Beijing News
October 22, 2008

The top headline The Beijing News today reported that Zhang Mingqing (张铭清), former spokesman of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council and chairman of the Straits Exchange Foundation, was attacked yesterday when he was visiting a Confucius Temple in Tainan city of Taiwan. Zhang was visiting Taiwan to present at a video and communication symposium as the dean of the journalism school of Xiamen University.

The newspaper reported that Zhang was attacked by a mob led by Wang Tingyu, Democratic Progressive Party Tainan city councilman. He was “pushed over” and “hit on the back of his head”, and “the attackers stamped on the roof of his car and hit the car with a flag pole when he was leaving”. Zhang suffered a minor muscle injury.

The article does not mention why the mob attacked Zhang. According to an AP report:

Pro-independence protesters in southern Taiwan pushed an envoy from rival China to the ground on Tuesday while shouting that their island does not belong to Beijing.

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