Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jou's (馬英九) campaign team yesterday said his rival, Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), was behind recent attacks against Ma and his family in a local publication -- an allegation the Hsieh camp denied.
A new Chinese-language newspaper, Taiwan Weekly, currently on a trial run, accused Ma's wife, Chow Mei-ching (
"Hsieh's camp has been making false accusations since the campaign started, and it is using the publication to spread rumors," Ma spokesman Luo Chih-chiang (
Tsai Shih-ping (
The Ma campaign team's lawyer, Lai Su-ju (賴素如), also a KMT Taipei city councilor, lashed out at the publisher and spokesperson of the publication for dodging legal responsibility by using pseudonyms.
Lai said the Taipei City Police Department could not find the name of the publisher, listed as Tseng Tien-hsiang (
Wang held a press conference yesterday afternoon and rebutted KMT allegations that Hsieh's campaign team funded the publication.
She did not specify where funding for the newspaper came from.
Wang, a radio host, also denied she used a pseudonym to avoid legal responsibility, noting that she has been using the name for more than 10 years.
Hsieh's camp yesterday denied it had anything to do with the weekly newspaper and a DVD attacking Ma.
"We are not that stupid to do something like this, because it is bad for our campaign," DPP deputy secretary-general Tuan Yi-kang (
A report in the Chinese-language Apple Daily yesterday, which said it had seen the DVD, said it showed four people who appeared in four different segments of the 41-minute feature.
One of them was a lawyer who criticized the KMT's suppression of the founding of the Taiwan Party.
Another was Taiwan Party Chairman Huang Shui-mu (
The third person was a former investigator at the Investigation Bureau, who claimed that the KMT used judges and prosecutors as informants.
The fourth man did not show his face, but wore a brown paper bag marked "Mr. X." He chastised KMT Legislator Chiu Yi (
Tuan said he did not know about the DVD until he read the newspaper yesterday morning, adding that he was curious to know whether the DVD was produced for a political purpose or for personal profit.
Tuan urged those who possess a copy of the DVD to refrain from watching and distributing it.
At a different setting in Taipei City, Hsieh said he was against such a "dirty trick."
Additional reporting by staff writer
The Chinese military has built landing bridge ships designed to expand its amphibious options for a potential assault on Taiwan, but their combat effectiveness is limited due to their high vulnerability, a defense expert said in an analysis published on Monday. Shen Ming-shih (沈明室), a research fellow at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said that the deployment of such vessels as part of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy’s East Sea Fleet signals a strong focus on Taiwan. However, the ships are highly vulnerable to precision strikes, which means they could be destroyed before they achieve their intended
About 4.2 million tourist arrivals were recorded in the first half of this year, a 10 percent increase from the same period last year, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. The growth continues to be consistent, with the fourth quarter of this year expected to be the peak in Taiwan, the agency said, adding that it plans to promote Taiwan overseas via partnerships and major events. From January to June, 9.14 million international departures were recorded from Taiwan, an 11 percent increase from the same period last year, with 3.3 million headed for Japan, 1.52 million for China and 832,962 to South Korea,
SOVEREIGNTY: The rigs show that Beijing ‘rejects Taiwan’s jurisdiction’ by building in areas where Taipei demands permission to build or alter installations Chinese oil rigs have been sighted just 26 nautical miles (42km), from Taiwan’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) near Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙島), posing a threat to Taiwan’s sovereignty if left unchallenged, a brief published by the Jamestown Foundation on Tuesday said. Pratas Island, 444km from Kaohsiung, is northeast of the South China Sea and houses a Taiwanese garrison. The brief, titled “Rigging the Game: PRC Oil Structures Encroach on Taiwan’s Pratas Island” — referring to the People’s Republic of China — analyzed photographs and said that Beijing’s tools to pressure Taiwan now include oil rigs. “Oil rigs now constitute part of Beijing’s
The Taiwan Experience Education Program (TEEP) has funded short-term internships in Taiwan for more than 4,500 young people from more than 40 countries since 2015, with the goal of attracting and retaining international talent, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. Fifty-five colleges launched 514 projects this year, including in fields such as semiconductors, artificial intelligence, medicine and biotechnology, green energy, and sustainability, it said. The program provides research and practical internships in Taiwan for two to six months, and offers cultural exchange and networking opportunities, the ministry said. For example, National Formosa University’s Embedded System and Autopilot Laboratory developed two solar-powered drones in
RSS