Political bickering and long hours marked yesterday's Procedure Committee meeting at the legislature, the first of its kind since the lawmaking body convened about two months ago and Premier Frank Hsieh (
Apparently upset by the pan-blue camp's continual boycotting of bills proposed by the pan-green camp, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus whip Lai Ching-te (
"Shame on you! While you are selling improperly acquired party assets and shutting down inter-party talks with others, you are keen on visiting China and talking with Chinese authorities," Lai said, shouting into the microphone. "We find your audacious attitude unacceptable!"
People First Party (PFP) caucus whip Lee Yung-ping (李永萍) then sprinted to another podium and asked Lai to stop making his "political speeches."
Lai then engaged in verbal sparring with freshman Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmaker Alex Fai (費鴻泰), who began calling Lai a "son of a bitch," but stopped himself midway through the insult.
"Who do you think you are!" Lai shouted back. "Our country will be ruined by guys like you! You are so blind that you can't even see the danger of the `Anti-Secession' Law."
Lai, flanked by pan-green lawmakers, held a press conference after the committee meeting to voice his grievances, and then the KMT and PFP caucuses held separate press conferences to condemn Lai's behavior.
Saying that he felt "distraught" and "angry," Chen Chieh (陳杰) said that Lai's "performance" was a devious plot aimed at preventing KMT Chairman Lien Chan (連戰) from visiting China.
"We demand an apology from him, or we will send him to the Discipline Committee for appropriate punishment," he said. Lee echoed Chen Chieh's remark and called on committee members officiating the meeting to remain politically neutral and refrain from making emotional and political remarks.
Another PFP lawmaker, Lin Yu-fang (
The meeting was at a standstill for almost an hour until a vote was called to decide whether to shelve the bills proposed by the DPP and TSU caucuses. Exercising its numerical advantage, the pan-blue dominated committee voted 17 to 12 in favor of blocking the pan-green bills.
The bills included the arms procurement plan, the confirmation of President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) selections of Control Yuan members, the draft national loyalty bill, draft amendments to the Public Debt Law (公債法) and the statute regarding the survey and disposition of assets acquired by political parties and their affiliates.
Committee members also voted in favor of sending the draft amendment to the household registration law to the Interior Committee and Finance Committees for review.
The law requires everyone over the age of 14 to provide their fingerprints in order to be issued photo identification cards.
The government has been seeking to abolish the fingerprinting stipulation and an amendment has been submitted to the Legislative Yuan but has not yet passed.
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) mention of Taiwan’s official name during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Wednesday was likely a deliberate political play, academics said. “As I see it, it was intentional,” National Chengchi University Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies professor Wang Hsin-hsien (王信賢) said of Ma’s initial use of the “Republic of China” (ROC) to refer to the wider concept of “the Chinese nation.” Ma quickly corrected himself, and his office later described his use of the two similar-sounding yet politically distinct terms as “purely a gaffe.” Given Ma was reading from a script, the supposed slipup
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,
The bodies of two individuals were recovered and three additional bodies were discovered on the Shakadang Trail (砂卡礑) in Taroko National Park, eight days after the devastating earthquake in Hualien County, search-and-rescue personnel said. The rescuers reported that they retrieved the bodies of a man and a girl, suspected to be the father and daughter from the Yu (游) family, 500m from the entrance of the trail on Wednesday. The rescue team added that despite the discovery of the two bodies on Friday last week, they had been unable to retrieve them until Wednesday due to the heavy equipment needed to lift