A protester heckled Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) as he addressed a groundbreaking ceremony for three construction projects of the airport MRT line yesterday.
The protester was later identified as Chang Chia-ling (張嘉玲), spokesperson of the Taiwan Shadow Government (台灣維新影子政府), the organization launched by former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Frank Hsieh (謝長廷).
Holding a poster, Chang shouted: “An incompetent government should apologize and be dismissed” when it was Liu’s turn to speak.
PHOTO: CNA
Security personnel and staff of the Bureau of High Speed Rail then carried her away.
A police station in Sinjhuang (新莊) confirmed that Chang was planning to run for a seat in the Taipei County Council at the end of this year. Both Taipei County Commissioner Chou Hsi-wei (周錫瑋) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) condemned Chang’s protest, saying that it was intended to get media exposure. After the incident, Liu continued his speech, unperturbed by the outburst.
Construction was scheduled to begin yesterday on the section of the Airport Rail from Sanchong (三重) to Taishan (泰山), which will be 13.2km long.
The section will have five stations, including stops at Sanchong, Wugu (五股), Sinjhuang, Taishan and Taishan Gueihe (泰山貴和).
The section between Sanchong and Jhongli (中壢) is scheduled to be completed by June 2013. The entire route is to be finished by October 2014.
Bureau Director Ju Hsu (朱旭) said passengers would be able to check in at Taipei Main Station before they board an airplane once the rail begins to operate.
He said, however, that the bureau would also have rooms in both Wugu station and the high-speed rail station in Taoyuan that will allow passengers to check in their luggage.
Ju said that the Ministry of Transportation and Communications was evaluating whether the Taiwan Railway Administration or Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (台北捷運公司) should run the Airport Rail.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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