Improving cross-strait relations should be one of the most important issues facing President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) during his remaining two years in office, Legisla-tive Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) said yesterday.
"I recommended to the president before the Dec. 3 local elections that improving cross-strait relations should be placed at the top of his agenda before his terms expires in two years' time," Wang said.
"I told him that the public hopes to see a new cross-strait policy. I will not take the initiative nor has the president asked me to [negotiate with China], but if the country needs me, I'm more than happy to serve at the pleasure of the president," he said.
In addition to proposing to the president that talks between China's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS) and the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) of Taiwan should be resumed as soon as possible, Wang said that he told the president that the planned second Economic Development Advisory Conference should address non-economic issues, such as cross-strait affairs and the resolution of political confrontation.
Wang said that he made the recommendation while meeting with the president regarding the president's appointment of his APEC envoy.
Wang was appointed by the president to represent him at the APEC summit in Busan, South Korea last month. After pressure from China, Seoul objected to Wang's selection and asked Chen to send someone with a stronger economics background instead.
The appointment was seen by analysts as a gesture to award Wang's impartiality in the legislature.
Wang said that although Beijing has more than once asked pan-blue lawmakers to relay its wish to see him visit China, he does not have any such plans at the moment.
It is important to obtain government authorization, Wang said, or it will be a waste of time even if both sides eventually reach a concrete agreement.
"We simply cannot ignore the Chinese market while mapping out the nation's economy policy," Wang said.
"He must come up with a more solid policy on how to make cross-strait transportation convenient and keep Taiwanese businesspeople here [in Taiwan]," he said.
The inspection equipment and data transmission system for new robotic dogs that Taipei is planning to use for sidewalk patrols were developed by a Taiwanese company, the city’s New Construction Office said today, dismissing concerns that the China-made robots could pose a security risk. The city is bringing in smart robotic dogs to help with sidewalk inspections, Taipei Deputy Mayor Lee Ssu-chuan (李四川) said on Facebook. Equipped with a panoramic surveillance system, the robots would be able to automatically flag problems and easily navigate narrow sidewalks, making inspections faster and more accurate, Lee said. By collecting more accurate data, they would help Taipei
STATS: Taiwan’s average life expectancy of 80.77 years was lower than that of Japan, Singapore and South Korea, but higher than in China, Malaysia and Indonesia Taiwan’s average life expectancy last year increased to 80.77 years, but was still not back to its pre-COVID-19 pandemic peak of 81.32 years in 2020, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. The average life expectancy last year increased the 0.54 years from 2023, the ministry said in a statement. For men and women, the average life expectancy last year was 77.42 years and 84.30 years respectively, up 0.48 years and 0.56 years from the previous year. Taiwan’s average life expectancy peaked at 81.32 years in 2020, as the nation was relatively unaffected by the pandemic that year. The metric
TAKING STOCK: The USMC is rebuilding a once-abandoned airfield in Palau to support large-scale ground operations as China’s missile range grows, Naval News reported The US Marine Corps (USMC) is considering new sites for stockpiling equipment in the West Pacific to harden military supply chains and enhance mobility across the Indo-Pacific region, US-based Naval News reported on Saturday. The proposed sites in Palau — one of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies — and Australia would enable a “rapid standup of stored equipment within a year” of the program’s approval, the report said, citing documents published by the USMC last month. In Palau, the service is rebuilding a formerly abandoned World War II-era airfield and establishing ancillary structures to support large-scale ground operations “as China’s missile range and magazine
A 72-year-old man in Kaohsiung was sentenced to 40 days in jail after he was found having sex with a 67-year-old woman under a slide in a public park on Sunday afternoon. At 3pm on Sunday, a mother surnamed Liang (梁) was with her child at a neighborhood park when they found the man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and woman, surnamed Huang (黃), underneath the slide. Liang took her child away from the scene, took photographs of the two and called the police, who arrived and arrested the couple. During questioning, Tsai told police that he had met Huang that day and offered to
RSS