The appointment of Su Tseng-chang (
Vice President Annette Lu (
The two can help each other since their areas of expertise are in different areas, she added
Su, whose nickname is ``electrical fireball (電火球)'' -- earned when he was a democracy campaigner in the 1980s -- is an experienced politician, while Tsai's expertise is in international affairs and cross-strait relations. She has a doctorate from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
"Females always notice things that males cannot. It is a perfect balance," Lu said.
But Lu also reminded her fellow politician not to become arrogant after taking up her post.
People First Party (PFP) Legislator Liu Wen-hsiung (
"When [Tsai] was chairwoman of the Mainland Affairs Council, the president always took her advice to design national policies toward China," Liu said. "I am really concerned that our China policy will be tightened and become stricter again now that she will become vice premier."
PFP caucus whip Hwang Yih-jiau (
"It is the president's call, not a vice premier's," Hwang said. "I sincerely wish Su and Tsai good luck. I also hope they can do something for the people."
In an interview with the Central News Agency (CNA), former US ambassador to China James Lilley said President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) had made "a correct decision" in appointing Su as the new premier.
"[Outgoing Premier Frank] Hsieh [謝長延] is an ideal person for the premier's office. But, if he needs to be replaced for whatever reason, Su would be the best choice because Su is an energetic character and is also a person with lots of fresh ideas," Lilley was quoted as saying.
Alan Romberg, senior associate and Director of the East Asia Program of the Henry L. Stimson Center, a US think tank based in Washington, told CNA that Su and Tsai will make a "formidable combination" in terms of intelligence, talent and experience.
A key factor in their ability to have an impact will be the relationship between the president, the premier, the legislature and the DPP, Romberg said.
Another factor will be how Su, Hsieh and other potential DPP candidates for the 2008 presidential poll view the links between those various nodes of power, especially on the question of who is going to set policy, he added.
The Su-Tsai pairing was also regarded by some as a potential combination to represent the DPP in the 2008 presidential election.
In a letter to the editor in the Chinese-language newspaper the Liberty Times, the Taipei Times' sister paper, Chen Chao-jian (陳朝建), an assistant professor in the Public Affairs Department at Ming Chuan University, said that Su and Tsai may be the best candidates for the DPP in 2008 because they have "the best reputations and are popular enough" to compete with pan-blue superstar and potential presidential candidate Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九).
"When the DPP administration was being haunted by the Kaohsiung Rapid Transit Corp scandal, Su and Tsai seemed to be removed from the dirt and neutral," Chen Chao-jian wrote.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
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