President Chen Shui-bian (
The eight nominees are to succeed the eight grand justices whose terms of office will expire at the end of September, including Judicial Yuan President Weng Yueh-sheng (
terms of office
According to the additional articles of the Constitution, eight grand justices, including the president and the vice president of Judicial Yuan who were appointed in 2003, shall serve four years, while the rest of the grand justices shall serve eight years.
The Chinese-language China Times yesterday quoted an anonymous source as saying that incumbent Grand Justice Lai Ying-jaw (
Wang yesterday refused to comment on the rumored candidates for the Judicial Yuan's president and vice president, but said the next president of the Judicial Yuan would be selected from the seven incumbent grand justices whose terms of office expire in 2011. The next vice president would be one of the eight new nominees, according to Wang.
hasty
A group of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers yesterday criticized Chen for not giving the legislature sufficient time to review his nominees of grand justices.
KMT legislative caucus whip Hsu Shao-ping (
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Hsu Kuo-yung (
new session
"I had heard that the KMT would try to put off the review process as long as possible because they wanted to reserve the nomination for KMT presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (
Later yesterday, after having a cross-party negotiation meeting, Wang said that legislative caucus whips across party lines had all agreed to review the president's nominees on Sept. 7 when the new session starts.
STAY AWAY: An official said people should avoid disturbing snakes, as most do not actively attack humans, but would react defensively if threatened Taitung County authorities yesterday urged the public to stay vigilant and avoid disturbing snakes in the wild, following five reported snakebite cases in the county so far this year. Taitung County Fire Department secretary Lin Chien-cheng (林建誠) said two of the cases were in Donghe Township (東河) and involved the Taiwan habus, one person was bit by a Chinese pit viper near the South Link Railway and the remaining two were caused by unidentified snakes. He advised residents near fields to be cautious of snakes hiding in shady indoor areas, especially when entering or leaving their homes at night. In case of a
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake struck off the coast of Hualien County in eastern Taiwan at 7pm yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The epicenter of the temblor was at sea, about 69.9km south of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 30.9km, it said. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The earthquake’s intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was highest in Taitung County’s Changbin Township (長濱), where it measured 5 on Taiwan’s seven-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 4 in Hualien, Nantou, Chiayi, Yunlin, Changhua and Miaoli counties, as well as
ENERGY RESILIENCE: Although Alaska is open for investments, Taiwan is sourcing its gas from the Middle East, and the sea routes carry risks, Ho Cheng-hui said US government officials’ high-profile reception of a Taiwanese representative at the Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference indicated the emergence of an Indo-Pacific energy resilience alliance, an academic said. Presidential Office Secretary-General Pan Men-an (潘孟安) attended the conference in Alaska on Thursday last week at the invitation of the US government. Pan visited oil and gas facilities with senior US officials, including US Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, US Secretary of Energy Chris Wright, Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy and US Senator Daniel Sullivan. Pan attending the conference on behalf of President William Lai (賴清德) shows a significant elevation in diplomatic representation,
Credit departments of farmers’ and fishers’ associations blocked a total of more than NT$180 million (US$6.01 million) from being lost to scams last year, National Police Agency (NPA) data showed. The Agricultural Finance Agency (AFA) said last week that staff of farmers’ and fishers’ associations’ credit departments are required to implement fraud prevention measures when they serve clients at the counter. They would ask clients about personal financial management activities whenever they suspect there might be a fraud situation, and would immediately report the incident to local authorities, which would send police officers to the site to help, it said. NPA data showed