TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan’s representative to Finland, Freddy Lim (林昶佐), spoke at the World Village Festival in Helsinki on Sunday about the country’s democratic transition and its experience countering Chinese cognitive warfare.
Lim delivered the speech “From Suppression to Freedom: The Fight Against Digital Control.” The festival, organized annually by an NGO alliance since 1995, brings together civil society groups, artists, and activists from around the world, per CNA.
Lim opened his presentation with a video of his band, Chthonic, performing at Kaohsiung’s Megaport Festival. After the video ended, he stepped on stage in a suit and joked that he would keep his speech respectable and leave his shirt on.
He then outlined Taiwan’s path from authoritarianism to democracy, including the 38-year martial law period when publications were censored, Taiwanese songs were tightly controlled, and artists considered subversive risked imprisonment, according to CNA.
Lim said authoritarian governments suppress art because it can empower people. He added that artists played an important role in Taiwan’s democratic transition during the 1990s. He said Taiwan’s democracy ranks among the strongest in Asia, noting that Taiwan became the first country in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage in 2019.
He then addressed the newer threat of cognitive warfare. Lim said China has industrialized information manipulation by spreading narratives of “democratic failure” through the internet and media in an effort to undermine Taiwanese society.
Lim also said China has expanded disinformation campaigns globally using large language models targeting democratic societies, including the Philippines, India, Lithuania, and the Czech Republic.
Later in the event, Lim shared the stage with a Burmese artist and video creator now living in Europe. To avoid identification, the artist appeared wearing makeup and a half-face mask while describing conditions in her country following the military coup, per CNA.
The artist said murals were defaced within days of the junta takeover and that six poets were killed during the first two years after the coup. She also alleged that China exported surveillance technology to assist the military government in tracking dissent. “This is not just cutting off communications; it’s eliminating witnesses,” the artist said.
The artist then invited Lim and audience members to raise the three-finger salute originating from “The Hunger Games,” which has become a symbol of pro-democracy movements in Southeast Asia.
Lim said festival organizers initially offered him the choice between giving a solo speech or appearing with the Burmese artist, and he immediately chose the latter. He said Myanmar’s situation has long concerned the international human rights community and that he empathized deeply with the artist’s experiences.
“It’s better to let the victims on the front lines speak than for me to speak myself,” Lim said. He added that the event reflected a broader global trend. “We are witnessing the erosion of democratic values around the world,” he said.
Last week, Lim also gave interviews to Finnish media outlets, including Iltalehti and Maailman Kuvalehti. Iltalehti focused on Taiwan’s situation during a Trump-Xi summit in Beijing, while Maailman Kuvalehti discussed art, disinformation, and democratic resilience.
