President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in his New Year’s address yesterday that Taiwan’s future should be decided by its 23 million people and that both sides of the Taiwan Strait must not fight over political power, but work together for core values.
“The two sides of the Taiwan Strait should not fight over political power, unification or independence, or international space,” Ma said. “They should be motivating each other to upgrade core values such as freedom, democracy, human rights and the rule of law.”
As the Republic of China (ROC) celebrates the centennial of its founding this year, Ma vowed to dedicate the next 10 years to building a “golden decade” for Taiwan and laying a foundation for another 100 years of the ROC.
Photo: CNA
“The prospects of the country and future of Taiwan are in the hands of its 23 million people,” he said. “We will use our strength to protect the sovereignty of the ROC, our actions to defend Taiwan’s dignity and our wisdom to build Taiwan’s future.”
In yesterday’s address, entitled “Building up Taiwan, Invigorating Chinese Heritage,” Ma said cross-strait peace is the cornerstone of peace and prosperity in East Asia and the joint responsibility of both sides of the Taiwan Strait.
He urged the two sides to deepen their exchanges, better understand each other, accumulate more mutual trust and gradually resolve differences. Under the guidance of “the wisdom of Chinese culture (中華文化智慧),” Ma said he hoped both sides could build a better future for the “Chinese nation.”
For the next century, Ma said he would like to see the ROC become a navigator of Chinese culture (中華文化), a model of democracy in the Chinese community (華人世界) and a global innovation center.
The ROC is an independent sovereignty, Ma said, and he hoped someday all yan huang zisun (炎黃子孫, or descendants of emperors Yan and Huang) would enjoy a way of life that is free, democratic and follows the rule of law. He believed that the dream would soon come true and that China could learn from Taiwan’s experience of democratization.
Ma’s comment on Taiwan’s future echoed that made by Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Minister Lai Shin-yuan (賴幸媛), who recently said the 23 million Taiwanese have the right to free choice in terms of Taiwan’s future.
During an international forum on cross-strait relations in Taipei early last month, Lai laid down what she called the seven core interests of Taiwanese. They are democracy, sovereignty, security, the right to meaningful participation in international organizations, the right not to be discriminated against, the right for the disadvantaged to survive and the right to free choice on the future of cross-strait relations.
Her comment, however, was questioned by Control Yuan member Chou Yang-shan (周陽山), who said the right to free choice ran counter to a core value of the ROC Constitution, a precondition of which is “national unification” with China.
Meanwhile, the council yesterday offered a boilerplate answer to Chinese President Hu Jintao’s (胡錦濤) New Year address in which Hu said China would insist on -peaceful unification and “one country, two systems” when pushing for the peaceful development of cross-strait relations.
MAC Deputy Minister Liu Te-shun (劉德勳) said both sides have used institutionalized negotiation mechanisms to resolve many problems. The Ma government would continue to negotiate with China and deepen cross-strait exchanges under the framework of the ROC Constitution and ensure that Taiwan is always the focus and the people’s interest comes first, Liu added.
The paramount chief of a volcanic island in Vanuatu yesterday said that he was “very impressed” by a UN court’s declaration that countries must tackle climate change. Vanuatu spearheaded the legal case at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, which on Wednesday ruled that countries have a duty to protect against the threat of a warming planet. “I’m very impressed,” George Bumseng, the top chief of the Pacific archipelago’s island of Ambrym, told reporters in the capital, Port Vila. “We have been waiting for this decision for a long time because we have been victims of this climate change for
MASSIVE LOSS: If the next recall votes also fail, it would signal that the administration of President William Lai would continue to face strong resistance within the legislature The results of recall votes yesterday dealt a blow to the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) efforts to overturn the opposition-controlled legislature, as all 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers survived the recall bids. Backed by President William Lai’s (賴清德) DPP, civic groups led the recall drive, seeking to remove 31 out of 39 KMT lawmakers from the 113-seat legislature, in which the KMT and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) together hold a majority with 62 seats, while the DPP holds 51 seats. The scale of the recall elections was unprecedented, with another seven KMT lawmakers facing similar votes on Aug. 23. For a
Taiwan must invest in artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics to keep abreast of the next technological leap toward automation, Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) said at the luanch ceremony of Taiwan AI and Robots Alliance yesterday. The world is on the cusp of a new industrial revolution centered on AI and robotics, which would likely lead to a thorough transformation of human society, she told an event marking the establishment of a national AI and robotics alliance in Taipei. The arrival of the next industrial revolution could be a matter of years, she said. The pace of automation in the global economy can
All 24 lawmakers of the main opposition Chinese Nationalists Party (KMT) on Saturday survived historical nationwide recall elections, ensuring that the KMT along with Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) lawmakers will maintain opposition control of the legislature. Recall votes against all 24 KMT lawmakers as well as Hsinchu Mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) and KMT legislative caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅崐萁) failed to pass, according to Central Election Commission (CEC) figures. In only six of the 24 recall votes did the ballots cast in favor of the recall even meet the threshold of 25 percent of eligible voters needed for the recall to pass,