Taiwan opens memorial denouncing late president

TAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan's government on Tuesday reopened what used to be a monument to late president Chiang Kai-shek but is now a memorial to what the ruling party describes as his brutal dictatorship over the island.

The move is part of the Democratic Progressive Party's campaign over the past few years to recast Chiang's role in Taiwan's history, marked by authoritarian rule and strong-arm treatment of the Taiwanese people.

Chiang, who had ruled all of China, became a massively polarizing figure in Taiwan after fleeing there in 1949 with his Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) government following the loss of the mainland to Mao Zedong's Communist armies.

Critics of the campaign say the moves are simply aimed at stirring up anti-Kuomintang sentiment ahead of key parliamentary polls later this month and a presidential election in March.

Chen's party has its powerbase in southern Taiwan, traditionally hostile to the mainlanders who came over with Chiang and swiftly dominated the island.

Unveiling the "Goodbye Chiang Kai-shek--Anti-communist Democracy and Taiwan Roadmap" exhibition, President Chen Shui-bian said the event was "opening the door to democracy".

The hall, which stands at the end of a sprawling square in central Taipei, opened in April 1980 to honor Chiang following his death in 1975.

Then called the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, the 70-metre-high white stone structure has been renamed National Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall.

The almost 10-metre-high bronze statue of a seated Chiang remains, but the honor guards that long stood vigil have gone. The statue is now ringed by displays of victims of Chiang's rule as well as milestone events in Taiwan's transition to democracy.

"We have turned a hall that was originally a temple at which to worship an authoritarian dictator into a place for Taiwan people to reflect, study and explore the freedoms of democracy and human rights," Chen told a crowd of about 100 invited guests.

Some analysts say hundreds, possibly thousands, of people whose families had lived on the island for several generations before 1949 met harsh treatment under Chiang's one-party rule.

"This not only represents that the authoritarian dictatorship has been consigned to history, it also shows the real advent of Taiwan's democracy and freedom," the president said on Tuesday.

Chen's election victory in 2000 ended more than 50 years of Nationalist Party rule over the island.