Taiwanese trucker runs over reporters during demonstration

Dec 6, 2007, 10:29 GMT

Taipei - Five Taiwanese journalists were injured when a man rammed his truck into a group of TV reporters Thursday during a demonstration over the renaming of a memorial to late nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek.

Wang Jui-chang of the cable news network ETTV was in critical condition after being crushed under the vehicle.

'The journalist has bone factures in several places, internal bleeding, liver and lung injuries, and serious concussion,' said a doctor at the National Taiwan University Hospital. Other injured reporters were released from hospital after treatment.

The driver, identified as Peng Sheng-lin, rammed his truck into a crowd rallying in front of the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall to support the demolition of two plaques erected to commemorate the late leader. A rival crowd was nearby protesting against the demolition.

'I thought they wanted to rob me. I just passed by and they blocked my way. I was on my way to work,' Peng claimed after he was pulled from the truck, whose windshield was smashed by the angry crowd.

Police arrested Peng on charges of attempted manslaughter.

The incident highlighted the political standoff between the Taipei city government headed by opposition Nationalist Party mayor Hau Lung-pin, and the central government headed by Chen's pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party.

Chen decided to rename the memorial and tear down the plaques because he said it was unnecessary to 'continue to treat a dictator and a persecutor of human rights as a deity or a feudalist emperor and worship him.'

The president has long endeavoured to cut all ties to China and erase the legacy of Chiang, whose followers support Taiwan's eventual unification with China.

Chiang fled to Taiwan after losing the Chinese Civil War to the Communists in 1949 and ruled Taiwan with an iron fist until he died of illness in 1975.