Saying that the nation has no need to change its name, pan-blue leaders yesterday voiced their opposition to yesterday's demonstration urging the country's name be changed from "Republic of China" (ROC) to "Taiwan."
Speaking at the KMT's 16th national congress in Taipei, PFP Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) argued that the nation needs not a change of its name but a change of heart.
KMT Chairman Lien Chan (連戰) said that the responsibility of the leader of the ROC was to safeguard its existence.
"The responsibility of the one who is the leader of the Republic of China is to obey the ROC's Constitution and safeguard the ROC's existence," Lien said.
"The leader of the ROC should to be one who unifies its people, not divide them," Lien said, referring to DPP members participating in the demonstration whom Lien implied were under the leadership of President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁).
Chen did not actually participate in the march.
To rebut former president Lee Teng-hui's (李登輝) statement last week that "the Republic of China no longer exists," Soong stressed that "Republic of China truly exists in name and form.
"What the Republic of China needs is a rectification of its heart, which is more urgent than rectification of its name," Soong said.
"[Rectifying the ROC's heart] means to be sincere in safeguarding its existence, love its people and be firm in beliefs and a loyal follower of Sun Yat-sen's (孫中山) doctrines that said democracy is of the people, for the people and by the people."
"The name of our country is called the Republic of China and the land we stand on is called Taiwan," Soong said.
The KMT's headquarters is located directly opposite the Presidential Office outside which the demonstrators gathered.
A large contingent of police were on guard in the vicinity to deal with any clashes that may have broken out between the pro-independence demonstrators and pan-blue elements, who are known for their pro-unification pro-China stance.
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