The Ministry of National Defense began enforcing on Tuesday a personnel management rule which will prevent more than 20 positions for one-star general from being filled once they become vacant, defense sources said yesterday.
The rule, an administrative order, is part of the ministry's personnel streamlining efforts.
The plan will push colonels and captains who had the chance to become one-star generals into early retirement.
These officers will not be the only ones affected by the new rule. Lower-ranking personnel will also have fewer opportunities for promotions.
A defense source said the rule is illegal because it deprives the president of the right to appoint military officials to the rank of general.
"The rule is purely the brainchild of a few people in the ministry. The 20-something one-star general posts which have been vacant or will become vacant should be filled, since they have not been eliminated," the source said.
"The ministry's unilateral decision to stop these positions from being filled has sparked much criticism in the military. They argue that the ministry should have consulted its subordinate units before making the decision," he said.
"It is also strange that President Chen Shui-bian (
National Defense University Commandant General Chen Cheng-hsiang (
The air force is seen as the biggest loser, since among the 20-some positions to be left unoccupied, it claims six.
The new rule is scheduled to last for one to two years, during which time dozens of colonels and captains who are qualified to become one-star generals will have no choice but to retire early.
These officials could choose to wait, but it would make lower-ranking officials suffer since their path for promotion will be blocked by the more senior officers.
To prevent this, the ministry has decided to increase time it takes to be promoted. Those between the rank of major and colonel now need to wait an additional two years to be able to rise in rank.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching