WORLD : Taiwan Frees Newsman’s Killers

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Two gangsters convicted of murdering a Chinese-American journalist who criticized the Nationalist Chinese government were released from prison today, officials said. Chen Chi-li, 47, and Wu Tun, 40, were released from Kweishan Prison near Taipei after their requests for parole were granted, officials added.

The two former members of the Bamboo Union gang were convicted in 1986 of murdering Henry Liu in Daly City, a suburb of San Francisco, on the order of Taiwan’s former military intelligence chief, Vice Adm. Wong Hsi-ling.

Liu, 52, a writer for the Chinese-language San Francisco Journal, wrote a critical biography of Nationalist President Chiang Ching-kuo, who died in 1988. Liu was shot to death in 1984 in the garage of his home.