Taiwanese novelist and film director Giddens Ko (left / CNA file photo)

Taipei, Oct. 13 (CNA) Culture Minister Lung Ying-tai will not comment on China's reported ban on Taiwanese novelist and film director Giddens Ko and Chinese American historian Yu Ying-shih unless the news is substantiated, she said Monday.

Chinese websites reported Saturday that several publishers received a notice from China's State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television asking them to remove the books of Ko and Yu from their shelves and not publish books by Yu, Hong Kong writer and critic Leung Man-tao and several others.

Lung said that based on her understanding, Beijing has a set method of engaging in censorship, and the information she had seen over the past two days did not fit that pattern.

She said she would comment once the alleged ban had been clarified and confirmed.

The writers were allegedly banned because of their support for Hong Kong's Occupy Central movement or for being outspoken supporters of democracy and human rights.

Ko openly supported Taiwan's Sunflower student movement, which fought against a trade-in-services agreement signed between Taiwan and China last year.

In late September, he posted photos of his shaved head on his Facebook page, apparently in support of the Occupy Central movement in Hong Kong.

The three organizers of the movement and dozens of others had shaved their heads earlier in the month to show their determination in the battle for universal suffrage.

(By Tai Ya-chen, Christie Chen and Lilian Wu)
enditem/ls

Related:
●Oct. 12: Books by Taiwanese writer allegedly banned by China