Taipei police yesterday afternoon removed Green Party Taiwan candidate for the Da-an District (大安) legislative by-election Calvin Wen (溫炳原) from a tree at the Songshan Tobacco Factory after the latter stayed in the tree overnight in an attempt to prevent it from being cut down.
Environmental groups, including Green Party Taiwan, and local residents have opposed the Taipei City Government’s plan to turn the site of the former Songshan Tobacco Factory — which ceased operations in 1998 — into a sports and entertainment complex for fear that the project would damage the local ecosystem and deprive local residents of a green space at the heart of the city.
Left untouched by urban development since its establishment in the 1930s — and especially after it was shut down — the site is now covered with thick vegetation, providing a habitat to many rare species.
Despite the opposition, the city government signed a build-operate-transfer contract with the Farglory Group and began construction.
Removing old trees from the site is the initial step in the project.
Wen was among the environmentalists and local residents who rushed to block the removal of a camphor tree at the site of the factory on Friday.
While police arrested all other demonstrators, Wen on Friday escaped arrest and successfully prevented the tree from being removed by climbing it.
After several physical clashes on Friday between police and protestors, an agreement was reached whereupon four aides would be allowed to enter the site to look after Wen.
However, at about 1pm yesterday, officials from the Department of Education accompanied by police officers showed up and asked Wen’s aides to leave immediately.
As they refused to leave, police removed them by force.
“I refused to leave and the officers dragged me away and took me to the Xinyi Police Precinct Office — my back still hurts from it,” said Amnesty International Taiwan director Wang Hsing-chung (王興中), who was one of Wen’s four aides, after leaving the police station.
Afterwards, Wen, who had tied himself to the tree, was also forcibly removed by police officers who reached him only with the help of a fire truck.
“We will file a lawsuit against Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin [郝龍斌] based on the Environmental Impact Assessment Act [環境影響評估法],” Wen told the Taipei Times yesterday.
Green Party Taiwan accused the city government of violating the law because although the construction project passed the first environmental impact assessment, a second assessment was still in process since Farglory made changes to the project.
The Taipei Cultural and Sports Park — the official name of the future sports complex — executive secretary Lee Kan (李侃) declined to comment, while Department of Education Chief Secretary Lin Hsin-yao (林信耀) could not be reached for comment at press time.
The inspection equipment and data transmission system for new robotic dogs that Taipei is planning to use for sidewalk patrols were developed by a Taiwanese company, the city’s New Construction Office said today, dismissing concerns that the China-made robots could pose a security risk. The city is bringing in smart robotic dogs to help with sidewalk inspections, Taipei Deputy Mayor Lee Ssu-chuan (李四川) said on Facebook. Equipped with a panoramic surveillance system, the robots would be able to automatically flag problems and easily navigate narrow sidewalks, making inspections faster and more accurate, Lee said. By collecting more accurate data, they would help Taipei
STATS: Taiwan’s average life expectancy of 80.77 years was lower than that of Japan, Singapore and South Korea, but higher than in China, Malaysia and Indonesia Taiwan’s average life expectancy last year increased to 80.77 years, but was still not back to its pre-COVID-19 pandemic peak of 81.32 years in 2020, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. The average life expectancy last year increased the 0.54 years from 2023, the ministry said in a statement. For men and women, the average life expectancy last year was 77.42 years and 84.30 years respectively, up 0.48 years and 0.56 years from the previous year. Taiwan’s average life expectancy peaked at 81.32 years in 2020, as the nation was relatively unaffected by the pandemic that year. The metric
TAKING STOCK: The USMC is rebuilding a once-abandoned airfield in Palau to support large-scale ground operations as China’s missile range grows, Naval News reported The US Marine Corps (USMC) is considering new sites for stockpiling equipment in the West Pacific to harden military supply chains and enhance mobility across the Indo-Pacific region, US-based Naval News reported on Saturday. The proposed sites in Palau — one of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies — and Australia would enable a “rapid standup of stored equipment within a year” of the program’s approval, the report said, citing documents published by the USMC last month. In Palau, the service is rebuilding a formerly abandoned World War II-era airfield and establishing ancillary structures to support large-scale ground operations “as China’s missile range and magazine
A 72-year-old man in Kaohsiung was sentenced to 40 days in jail after he was found having sex with a 67-year-old woman under a slide in a public park on Sunday afternoon. At 3pm on Sunday, a mother surnamed Liang (梁) was with her child at a neighborhood park when they found the man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and woman, surnamed Huang (黃), underneath the slide. Liang took her child away from the scene, took photographs of the two and called the police, who arrived and arrested the couple. During questioning, Tsai told police that he had met Huang that day and offered to