Taipei - The US-based Cable News Network (CNN) has responded
to Taiwan Vice President Annette Lu's demand for apology over CNN's
'biased' story on Lu, but the content of the response is unknown, the
Central News Agency (CNA) said Friday.
'CNN headquarters in Atlanta sent us an envelop Thursday
afternoon, which we sent to the presidential office via Federal
Express. It should reach Taipei Saturday or Sunday,' CNA quoted Chang
Chung-jen, head of the Atlanta office of Taiwan's Government
Information Office (GIO), as saying. 'The envelop bore the name of
CNN Managing Director Chris Cramer, but we don't know the content of
the reply.'
On Tuesday, GIO passed on Lu's protest letter to CNN headquarters
in Atlanta. Cramer made the reply Thursday upon his return from a
business trip to Mexico.
The controversy erupted Tuesday when Lu held a news conference to
declare she would run for president in the 2008 election.
The US-based Associated Press (AP) news agency filed a story on
Lu's candidacy, saying in the lead that she was branded by China as
'insane' and 'the scum of the nation,' and said in the third
paragraph that Lu's chances of winning were slim.
CNN carried the AP story on its website, but used its own headline
'Taiwan's 'scum of the nation' runs for president,' triggering an
immediate protest from Lu's office.
Lu said that the CNN story had insulted her and the Taiwan people.
She demanded an apology and a correction and did not rule out seeking
damages.
CNN later changed its headline to 'Lu seeks to be first Taiwan
woman president,' but did not apologize.
Lu also sent a protest letter Wednesday to the AP, demanding an
apology and a correction within 48 hours.
AP's headquarters in New York apologized Thursday to Lu and
instructed its Taipei bureau to conduct an interview with Lu - and
let Lu 'say all she wants to say' - to produce balanced reporting, Lu
told reporters.
In an interview Wednesday with the cable TV channel TVBS, Lu said
she could not understand why AP was using words that China used to
blast her in 2002, calling the report 'unacceptable' and
'unforgivable.'
In Taiwan, the controversy has exploded into a political incident,
with Taiwan leaders and some lawmakers calling certain foreign
reporters siding with China and using China's words to insult Taiwan
leaders.
On Thursday, Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian criticized AP and CNN
for the 'biased' story on Lu.
Speaking at a dinner party for foreign envoys, Chen said that two
foreign news outlets adopted China's unobjective terminology and used
'rude and irresponsible words' in the headline of their story.
'I believe that any professional media group would not quote
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's words to criticize or attack US
President George W Bush, and use Chavez's words as the headline. But
such an unfortunate thing has happened to Vice President Lu,' Chen
said.
Lu, 62, a former dissident, human-rights activist and lawmaker,
angered China by openly declaring that Taiwan and China are two
countries and condemning Beijing's missile threats against Taiwan as
terrorism, prompting China's Taiwan expert Liu Jiayan to brand her
the 'scum of the nation' in a 2002 article.
But at home and abroad, Lu is widely lauded as a firm advocate of
Taiwan's sovereignty and an outspoken defender of human and women's
rights.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur 
USA
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