The legislature began its new session yesterday with lawmakers scheduling Premier Chang Chun-hsiung's (張俊雄) administrative report for Tuesday.
Lawmakers also decided to review the nomination for auditor-general next Friday.
The legislature was supposed to schedule hearings for the nominees for Judicial Yuan president and vice president and six positions on the Council of Grand Justices, but lawmakers decided to postpone setting a date for these reviews.
People First Party Legislator Lee Fu-tien (
"These positions are so important that we must proceed with each one carefully. However, I am afraid that the reviews may not be completed on time because several lawmakers are planning to visit Australia before the end of the month," Lee said.
Lee also presented a questionnaire containing 28 questions for the Judicial Yuan president, vice president and six grand justice nominees to fill in before the legislature begins the vetting process. Lee said that "party affiliation" was one of the questions.
"These questions will help lawmakers learn more about the candidates. The answers will also become an important source of information that will help us decide whether the candidates are capable of taking a neutral stance on all aspects related to justice," Lee said.
Lee said that candidates who failed to answer the questions honestly would be in violation of Article 214 of the Criminal Code and would face a potential jail sentence of up to three years or a fine of up to NT$500.
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
The eastern extension of the Taipei MRT Red Line could begin operations as early as late June, the Taipei Department of Rapid Transit Systems said yesterday. Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said it is considering offering one month of free rides on the new section to mark its opening. Construction progress on the 1.4km extension, which is to run from the current terminal Xiangshan Station to a new eastern terminal, Guangci/Fengtian Temple Station, was 90.6 percent complete by the end of last month, the department said in a report to the Taipei City Council's Transportation Committee. While construction began in October 2016 with an
NON-RED SUPPLY: Boosting the nation’s drone industry is becoming increasingly urgent as China’s UAV dominance could become an issue in a crisis, an analyst said Taiwan’s drone exports to Europe grew 41.7-fold from 2024 to last year, with demand from Ukraine’s fight against Russian aggression the most likely driver of growth, a study showed. The Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology (DSET) in a statement on Wednesday said it found that many of Taiwan’s uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) sales were from Poland and the Czech Republic. These countries likely transferred the drones to Ukraine to aid it in its fight against the Russian invasion that started in 2022, it said. Despite the gains, Taiwan is not the dominant drone exporter to these markets, ranking second and fourth
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comment last year on Tokyo’s potential reaction to a Taiwan-China conflict has forced Beijing to rewrite its invasion plans, a retired Japanese general said. Takaichi told the Diet on Nov. 7 last year that a Chinese naval blockade or military attack on Taiwan could constitute a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, potentially allowing Tokyo to exercise its right to collective self-defense. Former Japan Ground Self-Defense Force general Kiyofumi Ogawa said in a recent speech that the remark has been interpreted as meaning Japan could intervene in the early stages of a Taiwan Strait conflict, undermining China’s previous assumptions
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