Taitung County Magistrate Hsu Ching-yuan (徐慶元) said yesterday that if no other cities or counties in Taiwan are willing to accommodate radioactive waste produced by the Taiwan Power Company (Taipower), Taitung will not "shirk its social responsibility."
Hsu made the remarks in a press conference when he spoke about his stance on the nuclear waste storage site issue after he and representatives from the county's Tawu (大武) Township returned from an inspection mission to a nuclear waste dump in Japan.
Media reports had said that nuclear waste currently stored on the outlying Orchid Island will be relocated to Tawu, following President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) meeting with aboriginal leaders in Taitung County last week during which the president promised that the nuclear waste site dispute will be solved by the end of the year.
The reports said that Tawu, with a population of less than 10,000 and stark and precipitous terrain, has been chosen as an alternative to Orchid Island place after a tacit agreement reached between the state-owned Taipower and Taitung County.
Taipower also agreed to pay for the Japan visit by local elected officials and representatives, as well as a trip to Sweden next month, in an attempt to end any opposition to the plan, the reports said.
Taipower's contract to store nuclear waste on Orchid Island expired at the end of last year and the Tao Tribe, who live there, have never been happy with having the respository on their island. They have staged several protests in the past year aloner to demand its relocation.
Hsu noted that the waste has been stored on Orchid Island for more than two decades and he said Taitung County, heeding the will of the Tao, hopes that it can help with the relocation.
He said that Taiwan needs a final disposal site for low-level radioactive waste, especially because of Taiwan's stated goal of eventually becoming a "nuclear-free homeland."
If all nuclear power plants are decommissioned, there will be an urgent need for a well-equipped final dumping ground, he said.
But he also laid out three preconditions for the agreement: to make use of state-of-the-art technology of industrialized countries used to handle nuclear waste; to ensure full communication with local people and respect their will; and to ensure a comprehensive plan on other reciprocal measures such as the large sum of money and assistance needed for construction.
Faced with criticism of the plan, he said that "at least I will heal the wounds of Orchid Island and let the country have a more advanced, safer nuclear-waste dump."
He noted that when President Chen visited Orchid Island last year, he expressed hope that Hsu would help deal with the nuclear waste.
Hsu promised to help communicate with the people, for which Chen expressed appreciation and described him as the "most responsible and courageous" of all city and county chiefs.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods