President Chen Shui-bian's (
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Ting Shou-chung (
"I don't think it's necessary to review the budget in this session as the president's announcement that the council will cease to function has brought the nation to the brink of independence, which is unacceptable to many KMT members," Ting said.
PHOTO: CNA
The KMT had planned to release its own version of the arms procurement bill this month, a move regarded as a step toward resolving the deadlock over the long-stalled bill's review in the legislature. But Ting said yesterday that would not happen in the immediate future.
"Now that the president has caused the council to cease to function and put Taiwan-US relations at risk, I don't see why the KMT should back the bill in order to help Chen appease the US," he said.
Ting's position was not immediately backed by the KMT caucus, however, with KMT caucus whip Pan Wei-kang (
Meanwhile, the People First Party (PFP) legislative caucus said it would propose a motion to impeach the president, following the KMT's motion to recall the president.
"The president's recent words and deeds have sowed discord between ethnic groups, jeopardizing the nation's security, and thus he is guilty of sedition," PFP caucus whip Lu Hsueh-chang (
Lu said the procedure required to impeach the president is easier than that required to recall him, although both ultimately need the approval of the legislature.
"While the KMT and PFP have different motions, we will help each other to get the motions passed in the legislature," Lu said.
Under the current regulations, both motions need the approval of two-thirds of the legislature.
As the DPP holds more than one-third of the seats in the legislature, both motions will meet with significant opposition.
"There is no way the motions will be approved in the legislature," DPP caucus whip Yeh Yi-jin (葉宜津) said.
In an apparent bid to counter the opposition's moves, some pro-independence groups and DPP legislators Charles Chiang (
Also yesterday, the KMT and PFP planned to request that Premier Su Tseng-chang (
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