Jerome A. Cohen - Taiwan

Taiwan

Cohen's influence has been particularly strong in Taiwan where his former student, Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) is the current president.

In 1985, Cohen played a key role in securing the release of political prisoner Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) who had been a student of Cohen's at Harvard and who would later became vice-president of Taiwan.

Also in 1985, following the murder in San Francisco of Henry Liu, a Taiwanese-American author critical of the martial law government, Cohen served as a pro-bono representative of Liu's widow at the trial in Taipei. On appeal of what he thought was a show trial convicting reputed gangsters, he sought to show that the government was directly involved in the plot. The sentences were upheld, and later, Taiwan's chief of military intelligence was also convicted for his involvement.