The Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) yesterday rejected a DPP legislator's accusation that no one had registered to travel back to Taiwan via Kinmen under the Small Three Links agreement during the Lunar New Year vacation, saying that, in fact, "thousands of Taiwanese businessmen" have registered to do so.
DPP Legislator Chang Ching-fang (張清芳) made the charge yesterday at a press conference during which he argued that Taiwanese businessmen are reluctant to travel via the Small Three Links, because of the complicated application procedures established by the SEF.
SEF Deputy Secretary-General Jan Jyh-horng
"The precise number of businessmen has not yet been finalized. Applications are still being processed," Jan said.
He added that Chang had never sought confirmation of the true position from the SEF.
At his press conference, Chang had asked the SEF to scrap its application procedure and simply allow Taiwanese businessmen to register to travel via Kinmen by submitting their ID number or passport number. As it stands now, he said, it takes at least two to four weeks to complete the application process.
But Jan said that the application process cannot be changed.
"Taiwan is a country in which the rule of law applies," he said
Whether Taiwanese businessmen travel via Hong Kong or the Small Three Links, the correct legal procedures must apply," Jan said.
There are currently some 3,000 businessmen registered to take the indirect charter flights, Jan said.
He said that there is currently no deadline for applications from Taiwanese businessmen for the right to travel by either route.
Prosecutors in New Taipei City yesterday indicted 31 individuals affiliated with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) for allegedly forging thousands of signatures in recall campaigns targeting three Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers. The indictments stem from investigations launched earlier this year after DPP lawmakers Su Chiao-hui (蘇巧慧) and Lee Kuen-cheng (李坤城) filed criminal complaints accusing campaign organizers of submitting false signatures in recall petitions against them. According to the New Taipei District Prosecutors Office, a total of 2,566 forged recall proposal forms in the initial proposer petition were found during the probe. Among those
ECHOVIRUS 11: The rate of enterovirus infections in northern Taiwan increased last week, with a four-year-old girl developing acute flaccid paralysis, the CDC said Two imported cases of chikungunya fever were reported last week, raising the total this year to 13 cases — the most for the same period in 18 years, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday. The two cases were a Taiwanese and a foreign national who both arrived from Indonesia, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The 13 cases reported this year are the most for the same period since chikungunya was added to the list of notifiable communicable diseases in October 2007, she said, adding that all the cases this year were imported, including 11 from
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) today condemned the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) after the Czech officials confirmed that Chinese agents had surveilled Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) during her visit to Prague in March last year. Czech Military Intelligence director Petr Bartovsky yesterday said that Chinese operatives had attempted to create the conditions to carry out a demonstrative incident involving Hsiao, going as far as to plan a collision with her car. Hsiao was vice president-elect at the time. The MAC said that it has requested an explanation and demanded a public apology from Beijing. The CCP has repeatedly ignored the desires
RSS