Annette Lu facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Annette Lu
Lu Hsiu-lien |
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呂秀蓮
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Official portrait, 2005
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| 8th Vice President of the Republic of China | |
| In office 20 May 2000 – 20 May 2008 |
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| President | Chen Shui-bian |
| Preceded by | Lien Chan |
| Succeeded by | Vincent Siew |
| Chair of Democratic Progressive Party | |
| Acting 8 December 2005 – 15 January 2006 |
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| Preceded by | Su Tseng-chang |
| Succeeded by | Yu Shyi-kun |
| 10th Magistrate of Taoyuan | |
| In office 28 March 1997 – 20 May 2000 |
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| Preceded by | Liau Pen-yang (acting) Liu Pang-yu |
| Succeeded by | Hsu Ying-shen (acting) Eric Chu |
| Member of the Legislative Yuan | |
| In office 1 February 1993 – 31 January 1996 |
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| Constituency | Taoyuan County constituency |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 7 June 1944 Tōen Town, Shinchiku Prefecture, Japanese Taiwan (now Taoyuan District, Taoyuan City, Taiwan) |
| Nationality | Taiwanese |
| Political party | Democratic Progressive Party (after 1986) |
| Other political affiliations |
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| Education | National Taiwan University (LLB) University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (LLM) Harvard University (LLM) |
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| Traditional Chinese | 呂秀蓮 | ||||||||||||
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Annette Lu Hsiu-lien (Chinese: 呂秀蓮; pinyin: Lǚ Xiùlián; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Lū Siù-liân; born 7 June 1944) is a well-known Taiwanese politician. She is famous for her work as a feminist and for fighting for democracy in Taiwan. She became a member of the Democratic Progressive Party in 1990.
Annette Lu served as the Vice President of Taiwan from 2000 to 2008. She worked alongside President Chen Shui-bian. Before becoming Vice President, she was the Magistrate of Taoyuan County from 1997 to 2000. She was also elected to the Legislative Yuan, which is like Taiwan's parliament, in 1992.
Before her political career, Lu studied law at top universities. She later tried to run for president in 2007 and 2012 but decided to support other candidates. In 2019, she announced she would run for president again but later stopped her campaign.
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Early Life and Education
Annette Lu was born in Tōen Town, which is now Taoyuan City, in northern Taiwan. This was during the time when Taiwan was under Japanese rule. Her family has roots from both Hoklo and Hakka people. Her family came to Taiwan from Fujian, China, in 1740. She has one older brother and three older sisters.
After finishing high school at Taipei First Girls' High School, Lu went on to study law. She earned her first law degree from National Taiwan University (NTU) in 1967. Later, she earned two more law degrees (called Master of Laws or LL.M.) from universities in the United States. She studied at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign in 1971 and at Harvard Law School in 1978. While at Harvard, she was classmates with Ma Ying-jeou, who would later become a president of Taiwan.
Fighting for Democracy
In the 1970s, Annette Lu became a strong voice for women's rights in Taiwan. She wrote a book called New Feminism (Xin Nüxing Zhuyi). She left the Kuomintang (KMT) party and joined the tangwai movement. This movement was a group of people who wanted more democracy and an end to strict government rule. She worked for a magazine called Formosa Magazine, which supported these ideas.
Lu became very active in the democracy movement. In 1979, she gave a speech at a human rights event. This event later became known as the Kaohsiung Incident. After this, many leaders of Taiwan's democracy movement, including Lu, were arrested. She was found guilty by a military court and sent to prison for 12 years.
However, groups like Amnesty International called her a "prisoner of conscience." This means she was held because of her beliefs. Because of pressure from around the world, she was released in 1985. She had spent about five and a half years in jail.
In the 1990s, Lu worked hard to help Taiwan rejoin the United Nations. She believed Taiwan should join under its own name, "Taiwan," not "Republic of China."
Becoming an Elected Leader
Annette Lu joined the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in November 1990. In 1992, she was elected to the Legislative Yuan. This was an important step in her political career.
In 1997, she won the election to become the Magistrate of her hometown, Taoyuan. She held this job until 2000. That year, Chen Shui-bian chose her to be his running mate for the presidential election.
Her Time as Vice President (2000–2008)
On 18 March 2000, Annette Lu was elected Vice President of Taiwan. She was the first elected Vice President of Taiwan to use a Western first name. In 2001, she received the World Peace Prize from the World Peace Corps Mission.
Lu considered running for president in the 2008 ROC presidential election. She announced her plan on March 6, 2007. However, after getting a small number of votes in her party's primary election, she decided to withdraw from the race.
Campaign Incident
On 19 March 2004, during her re-election campaign in Tainan, Annette Lu was shot in her right knee. President Chen Shui-bian was also shot in his stomach at the same event. Both survived and left the hospital on the same day. The next day, the Chen/Lu team won the election by a very small margin.
Later Political Work
In March 2018, Lu announced her plan to run for mayor of Taipei for the Democratic Progressive Party. However, the party chose Pasuya Yao instead. After this, Lu said she intended to leave the party.
She remained a DPP member through 2019. In September 2019, she announced she would run for president in the 2020 Taiwan presidential election for the Formosa Alliance. Her running mate was Peng Pai-hsien. However, on 2 November 2019, Lu decided to stop her presidential campaign.
Her Views on Taiwan's Future
Annette Lu has always been a strong supporter of Taiwan independence. She believes Taiwan should be seen as a separate country from China. She has often spoken out about this more openly than other leaders.
She believes that Taiwan and China should have peaceful relations. In 2010, she visited South Korea and talked about "soft power." This means using peaceful economic and political development as a way to solve problems between countries.
In 2013, she spoke at George Washington University. She said that the Democratic Progressive Party should try to understand mainland China better. She believes Taiwan's future depends on what happens in mainland China. She also said that Taiwan and mainland China should be like "near neighbors" and work towards peaceful living, business cooperation, and cultural sharing.
However, she also warned against Taiwan slowly being taken over by China. She said that Taiwan is not against the idea of "one China" existing in the world. But she strongly believes that Taiwan is not part of China. She has often said that Taiwan has been an independent country since the 1996 Republic of China presidential election.
See also
In Spanish: Annette Lu para niños
- Politics of the Republic of China
- Democratic Pacific Union
