The DPP reached an agreement yesterday to expel scandal-ridden Legislator Cheng Yu-cheng (
Cheng said he regretted the Central Review Committee's decision, since he had already apologized for his actions and had earlier announced he would leave the party voluntarily.
The DPP hopes its decision to dismiss Cheng will help it repair the damage he has done to the party's image over the past few months.
Tu Wen-chin (
The decision strips Cheng of his party membership for neglecting his duty as a lawmaker. Cheng was absent from the legislative session for two months after he left for the US with his lover Sophie Wang (
The two stayed in Los Angeles for three months while Cheng waited for his wife, Lu Pei-ying (
Cheng returned to Taipei early this month, saying he could not endure Wang's violence. He said the affair was over and that he was ready to serve his country.
But Wang, who is reportedly two-months pregnant, has stayed in the media spotlight by continuing to demand to meet with Cheng. Two days ago, she asked Cheng for a divorce.
Cheng yesterday asked the party "not to focus on a power struggle designed to eliminate those who think differently."
Taipei on Thursday held urban resilience air raid drills, with residents in one of the exercises’ three “key verification zones” reporting little to no difference compared with previous years, despite government pledges of stricter enforcement. Formerly known as the Wanan exercise, the air raid drills, which concluded yesterday, are now part of the “Urban Resilience Exercise,” which also incorporates the Minan disaster prevention and rescue exercise. In Taipei, the designated key verification zones — where the government said more stringent measures would be enforced — were Songshan (松山), Zhongshan (中山) and Zhongzheng (中正) districts. Air raid sirens sounded at 1:30pm, signaling the
The number of people who reported a same-sex spouse on their income tax increased 1.5-fold from 2020 to 2023, while the overall proportion of taxpayers reporting a spouse decreased by 4.4 percent from 2014 to 2023, Ministry of Finance data showed yesterday. The number of people reporting a spouse on their income tax trended upward from 2014 to 2019, the Department of Statistics said. However, the number decreased in 2020 and 2021, likely due to a drop in marriages during the COVID-19 pandemic and the income of some households falling below the taxable threshold, it said. The number of spousal tax filings rebounded
A saleswoman, surnamed Chen (陳), earlier this month was handed an 18-month prison term for embezzling more than 2,000 pairs of shoes while working at a department store in Tainan. The Tainan District Court convicted Chen of embezzlement in a ruling on July 7, sentencing her to prison for illegally profiting NT$7.32 million (US$248,929) at the expense of her employer. Chen was also given the opportunity to reach a financial settlement, but she declined. Chen was responsible for the sales counter of Nike shoes at Tainan’s Shinkong Mitsukoshi Zhongshan branch, where she had been employed since October 2019. She had previously worked
Labor rights groups yesterday called on the Ministry of Labor to protect migrant workers in Taiwan’s fishing industry, days after CNN reported alleged far-ranging abuses in the sector, including deaths and forced work. The ministry must enforce domestic labor protection laws on Taiwan-owned deep-sea fishing vessels, the Coalition for Human Rights for Migrant Fishers told a news conference outside the ministry in Taipei after presenting a petition to officials. CNN on Sunday reported that Taiwanese seafood giant FCF Co, the owners of the US-based Bumble Bee Foods, committed human rights abuses against migrant fishers, citing Indonesian migrant fishers. The alleged abuses included denying