Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) spokesman Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦) said yesterday the party would soon decide what to do with two party members who attended a forum in China at the weekend against party directives.
Cheng said that the party was collecting information about the words and deeds of former DPP legislator Hsu Jung-shu (許榮淑) and former Council of Agriculture minister Fan Chen-tsung (范振宗) when they attended the two-day Fifth Cross-Strait Economic, Trade and Culture Forum in Changsha, Hunan Province, and would send the two to the party’s Central Review Committee for disciplinary action later this week.
He said the party had urged Hsu not to participate in the forum before her departure, but she went anyway.
After her return, Hsu said that she was moved by the friendliness, honesty and manner in which Chinese treated Taiwanese who visit China.
Cheng said it was obvious that Hsu was a victim of Beijing’s unification strategy.
Fan argues that the DPP had never told him not to attend the forum, but Fan is not a three-year old, Chang said, adding that he was a senior politician who once served as Hsinchu County commissioner.
It is impossible for him not to understand the party’s position on the matter, and it is impossible for him not to understand the political implications behind the Chinese Communist Party’s invitation for him to attend the forum, Cheng said.
DPP Legislator Chai Trong-rong (蔡同榮) yesterday said Hsu’s remarks in China that “the Chinese Communists had treated Taiwanese compatriots like their own flesh and blood” filled him with “disgust.”
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
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
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
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