According to Chinese official media Xinhua News Agency, on the morning of this Sunday (October 25), Fuzhou City, Fujian Province held a symposium to commemorate the 81st anniversary of Taiwan's liberation. According to reports, a total of about 200 people attended the meeting, including relatives of Taiwanese anti-Japanese survivors, descendants of revolutionaries who died in Taiwan, young people from both sides of the Taiwan Strait, representatives from Hong Kong, Macao and overseas, experts and scholars, etc.
Hong Xiuzhu, former chairman of the Kuomintang, attended and delivered a speech. According to Taiwan's "United News Network", Hong Xiuzhu said that Japan had no reflection or regret after its failed invasion of China. "It is still trying to restore militarism and must strictly guard against the resurgence of such wolf ambitions."
Hong Xiuzhu emphasized that we cannot expect stability on the one hand and constantly incite hostility on the other. He believed that if de-Sinicization and foreign forces are allowed to develop, people with feelings of family and country will gradually wither in a few decades. Young people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait will regard each other as strangers and even fight against each other. "What kind of anti-Japanese martyrs do we still have?"
Hong Xiuzhu also criticized the Democratic Progressive Party, saying that "in order to pursue the selfish interests of the party and itself, it has carried out a large-scale de-Sinicization in Taiwan, tampering with historical textbooks...erasing the blood and tears of the war of resistance and liberation, and implanting hatred and opposition in the hearts of children." He believes that "the confusion of national identity is the fundamental crisis of the current internal divisions and cross-strait confrontation in Taiwan."
According to Taiwan's "Liberty Times", Hong Xiuzhu said at the symposium that "if we do not work together to pursue national rejuvenation and complete the great cause of 'peaceful reunification,' Taiwan's future will be unimaginable." He also called on "I hope that the majority of Taiwanese folks, especially young friends, can clear the fog and bravely regain the pride of being an upright Chinese."
Hong Xiuzhu's speech in Fuzhou was reproduced by many mainland media. Taiwan's "Liberty Times" interviewed a Taiwanese official who is familiar with the United Front. The latter criticized the Kuomintang for catering to the CCP's unification narrative, and would go to China to sing peace every time at important junctures, echoing the CCP's united front operations. He said Hong Xiuzhu's remarks were "not surprising at all."
Xinhuanet, China's official media, summarized Hong Xiuzhu's speech as "I hope that compatriots on both sides of the Taiwan Strait will jointly inherit the spirit of the anti-Japanese sages who protected the homeland, firmly work in the direction of peaceful reunification, and work hard to realize the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation."
October 18, 1946 (the 35th year of the Republic of China), October 25 was designated as the statutory holiday "Taiwan Liberation Day" to commemorate Taiwan's surrender on October 25, 1945. On October 25, 1949, the Chinese Communist army was defeated in the battle of attacking Kinmen. The Kuomintang won a rare victory in the late civil war, which was known in history as the "Guningtou Victory".
In May 2025, Taiwan's Legislative Yuan passed a law amendment to change "Taiwan's Liberation Day" to "Taiwan's Liberation and Kinmen Guningtou Victory Day". On October 24, 2025, the Standing Committee of China's National People's Congress voted to establish October 25 as "Taiwan's Liberation Day." The Democratic Progressive Party issued a statement at the time stating that the CCP was trying to use the "Taiwan Liberation Day" to deny Taiwan's sovereignty and compress Taiwan's space on the international stage. Lai Ching-te posted a message on Facebook to commemorate the Battle of Guningtou, "76 years ago, an important battle that changed Taiwan's history broke out at Guningtou in Kinmen...it blocked the CCP's invasion and shaped decades of peace."
Today, one year later, the People's Liberation Army's military media "Jun Zhengping Studio" issued an article stressing that "the history of Taiwan's recovery cannot be tampered with" and criticized Lai Qingde for "stubbornly following the evil path of 'going to China and resisting China'", saying that he "deliberately constructs a 'Historical View of Favoring Japan' and a 'Taiwan Independence Historical View'", and that "whitewashing the invaders as Taiwan's benefactors" is an act of "recognizing thieves as fathers and forgetting ancestors."
Cheng Lai-wen, the current chairman of the Kuomintang, also posted a post on Facebook to commemorate "Taiwan's Liberation Day." She wrote that "colonial scars should not be glorified," and "one should not deny feelings for this land because of each other's origins, identity, or political stance." Cheng Lai-wen said that "Taiwan's future needs security, dignity, and peace." She must be "prepared to face risks, and more importantly, determined to avoid war."
China's state-run media CCTV News released this Sunday an image titled "Jilin-1 Satellite's Space Perspective Overlooking Taiwan, Our Treasure Island," saying that "every street is clearly visible." The video is 42 seconds long and shows scenes from the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall to the Taipei National Palace Museum, the Taipei Arena, the Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall, the Chiang Kai-shek Bridge, the Yushan Mountains, Sun Moon Lake, Tamsui River, Hualien Qingshui Cliffs, Yilan Zhuangwei Township, Tainan Qingkun Fan Salt Fields, Chiayi Wetlands and Taipei Port.
