For the latest installment in his CDT series, cartoonist Crazy Crab of Hexie Farm comments on the recent deletion of a weibo account set up by Taiwanese politician Frank Hsieh. Hsieh is the former premier of the Democratic Progressive Party, which generally takes a pro-independence position on cross-Straits relations. Hsieh said he set up his account to better communicate with Chinese people, but it was deleted within 24 hours of registering.
In this cartoon, incoming Chinese president Xi Jinping is standing atop the Great Wall (or Great Firewall), promoting dialogue between mainland China and Taiwan, with strategically targeted missiles beside him. Taiwan’s President Ma Ying-jeou (on the right), who promotes unification with the mainland, optimistically sees Xi extending an olive branch, while Su Tseng-chang (on the left), another prominent DPP politician, expresses his disappointment with false expectations from China. Hsieh is seeing crashing into the wall of Internet censorship.
Read more about Hexie Farm’s CDT series, including a Q&A with the anonymous cartoonist, and see all cartoons so far in the series.
[CDT owns the copyright for all cartoons in the Hexie Farm CDT series. Please do not reproduce without receiving prior permission from CDT.]
