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Swedish man stabbed to death in Taiwan

A Swedish man in his fifties has been found stabbed to death in his apartment in Taiwan, with the man’s girlfriend detained by police on the suspicion of murder.

Published: 22 August 2012 16:12 CEST

Police responded to an emergency called placed by the Swedish man’s girlfriend on Monday, arriving to find the man dead in his apartment in Taoyuan City.

The man was found with two stab wounds to his neck, and blood was spilt all over the apartment, according to the China Post newspaper.

Three blood stained knives were confiscated from the apartment, with the Swedish man’s girlfriend being arrested after police found she was emotionally unstable and evasive under interrogation, according to the paper.

The woman denies the crime.

The foreign ministry has confirmed the death and notified the man’s relatives, but was unwilling to divulge any further information.

“A local crime investigation is underway but I cannot say more for the time being,” Linn Duvhammar of the foreign ministry told the TT news agency.

Neighbours told police that they had heard “heated quarrels” coming from the home before the police arrived, and surveillance cameras indicate that no one besides the victim and his girlfriend entered the apartment.

TT/The Local/og

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China derides Copenhagen democracy meet as 'political farce'

Demonstrators gathered outside the Copenhagen Democracy Summit on Tuesday. Photo: Emil Helms/Ritzau Scanpix

The Copenhagen Democracy Summit was held Monday and Tuesday in the Danish capital and organised by the Alliance of Democracies, an organisation targeted by Beijing sanctions in March and founded by former NATO boss Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

In addition to Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen and Hong Kong democracy activist Nathan Law, Danish Foreign Minister Jeppe Kofod also participated in the forum by video link, which Beijing said violated “the one-China principle.”

“This summit is a political farce,” the Chinese embassy in Denmark wrote in a statement published on Tuesday. “Inviting those who advocate Taiwan and Hong Kong ‘independence’ to the meeting violates the one-China principle and interferes in China’s internal affairs,” it said.

“Some hypocritical western politicians are good at meddling in other countries’ internal affairs and creating divisions and confrontation in the name of ‘democracy’ and ‘freedom’. They are bound to fail,” it added.

At the conference on Monday, Kofod said it was “deplorable” that Beijing had imposed sanctions on 10 European individuals and organisations in response to EU sanctions on Xinjiang officials over their actions against the Uyghur Muslim minority.

Like most countries, Denmark applies the one-China principle — under which Beijing bars other countries from having simultaneous diplomatic relations with Taipei — though it does maintain relations with Taiwan.

Cut off politically from the rest of China since the end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949, the territory is self-governing but is not recognised by
the United Nations.

Beijing considers Taiwan a rebel province that will one day return under its control, by force if necessary.

China’s sabre-rattling has increased considerably over the past year, with fighter jets and nuclear-capable bombers breaching Taiwan’s air defence zone on a near-daily basis.

“Our government is fully aware of the threats to regional security, and is actively enhancing our national defence capabilities to protect our
democracy,” Tsai told the conference in a video address on Monday. US President Joe Biden is expected to present his China strategy soon, as
calls mount for him to publicly commit to defending Taiwan militarily in the event of a Chinese attack.

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