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Taiwan election 2024
ChinaPolitics

Taiwan election 2024: alleged audio leak of Tsai Ing-wen amounts to ‘foreign interference’, DPP lawmaker says

  • In unverified recording, legislator and Taiwanese president appear to discuss personnel problems in their party in 2019
  • Commentator says it highlights factional differences within the ruling party

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Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen has not commented publicly on the recording. Photo: AFP
Amber Wangin Beijing
A leaked, unverified recording purportedly of Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen and a ruling party legislator discussing an apparent divide within the organisation has been dismissed by the lawmaker as interference by “foreign forces”.
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Taiwan-based Chung T’ien Television, which supports the opposition, quoted a commentator as saying the recording pointed to factional fighting within the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

The 41-minute recording first surfaced online on Sunday in the countdown to Taiwan’s presidential and legislative elections on Saturday, and appears to have been made in 2019.

During the conversation, a man and a woman discuss a wide range of issues including disagreements within the DPP about personnel as well as whether to play down the party’s stand on independence for Taiwan.

Tsai has not commented publicly on the recording, which has not been independently verified.

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But legislator Lo Chih-cheng, believed to be the man talking to Tsai, said on Sunday that the recording was “edited illegally” and the leak as interference by “foreign forces” in Taiwan’s presidential and legislative elections.

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