Solidarité Internationale pour la Défense de Lo-sheng- 楽生院を救え！国際連帯 - 搶救樂生國際鬥陣

After surrounding the residence of Su-Zhen-chang（蘇貞昌）, the Premier of Taiwan Executive Yuan, in March 8, about 2 hundred protesters march toward his residence in March 11 again. They performed the ‘kneel and obeisance’ action demonstrated by Korean Farmers in Hong Kong during the anti-WTO week in 2005. Although this is the second time the Losheng（樂生院, 樂生療養院, LoSheng Sanatorium, Leprosarium LoSheng, Happy Life Sanatorium） crowds using the action, apparently Politicians don’t buy it.

The police force had their full preparation, in less then 30 minutes the commander at scene declared that demonstrators had violated ‘the Act of gathering and parade’（集會遊行法）. According to the law, which is formulated right after 1988, at the end of Martial Law period, protesters could be arrested for settling an un-applied gathering that involved more then 3 people.

Then, the police force tried to cut crowds into pieces and disperse. In the end 150 people were detained, and after 2 hours of driving, the police dropped the crowds on a mountain far away from down town without enought clothing and most of them don’t have any money to get back to the city.

After the protests, the Taipei County Government started to release press statements that said all patients had already had about 7000 NT a month. But the protesters stressed, that the patients were forced to separate from society and their social relationships 70-50 years ago, the government has the duty to provide their living demands. The crowds emphasized that the patients’ basic demands can not be seen as ‘welfare’, but a ‘duty’. And the struggling in the past 4 years, is not asking for money but ‘freedom’. If the government insists to tear down the sanatorium, it follows the path of the colonial and the martial law era.

In march 15, the MRT(Mass Rapid Transit) section, Taipei（台北市捷運局）, was supposed to have a meeting with the Taipei county government（台北縣政府） for previous arrangement. Through cell-phone text messages mobilization, more the 50 people gathered in 3 hours and stopped the meeting.

The next day, mobile text messages spreaded the information that the police were to put up a tear down declaration. At 11:00 am, more than 200 police including special force intruded.

Although protesters had chained the gates, the 2 hundred police and special task forces intruded from a path back on the mountain. The protester didn’t have time to defend the site this time. After some clashes, officers from the county government pasted their declaration back up by the special task forces. And 4 students are arrested.

The patients, most of them are crippled with no legs and with no fingers, could only sit in their wheelchairs, and they can do nothing but surrounded by the students.

Police forces retreated after the tussling.

But, people are united for the struggle. The main union, ‘Losheng Youth alliance（青年樂生聯盟, Happy life youth alliance）’ which is organized mostly by college students, had already opened up space for debate on mainstream media: is Losheng a historical site need to be preserved? are there blemishes in the administrative procedures? and, where are the human rights for the Hansen’s disease patients’ to choose a place to live with autonomy?

Since 1989, many local organization, including the then President of the LoSheng Sanatorium had requested the Cultural Administration of Taipei County Government to declare LoSheng（樂生） a historical site, but none of the government sector had ever finish the procedure, not even the procedure to deny. The protesters insist, the patient should have the right to decide where to live with complete autonomy, which had been the guiding policy of the Japanese Government in dealing with Hansen’s disease Patients’ affaires.

More info:

Forgotten voices: 60 years on, Japan's hidden victims win compensation (8 Nov 2005)


樂生&漢生搶救人權立法推動陣線

Losheng Sanatorium on Wikipedia：english；Chinese

GVO：Taiwan: bloggers act on saving Lo-Sheng Sanatorium (11 Mar 2007)

Interlocals:Save the Losheng Sanatorium for the Lost Soul