Groups opposed to a proposed economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with China are planning to hold more protests, with former premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) yesterday saying he would hold one on May 20, the second anniversary of President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) inauguration.
With the government’s self-imposed deadline for signing the agreement next month approaching, opposition from pro-independence, pan-green and labor organizations is solidifying with a number of groups promising protests throughout this month and early next month.
A large rally led by pro-independence organizations, but yet to be endorsed by opposition parties, is expected to take place on June 6. However, organizers said the date has not been finalized, citing a possible delay in the government’s negotiating schedule for the ECFA from next month to early July.
PHOTO: LU CHUN-WEI, TAIPEI TIMES
Speaking at a press conference yesterday, Hsieh described the May 20 rally as a “warm up,” saying that a single protest “is just not enough.”
“Since his inauguration in 2008, President Ma has been leading Taiwan in the wrong direction,” Hsieh said, adding that an ECFA would unfairly benefit large corporations and threaten jobs and traditional industries.
Joining Hsieh were former Cabinet secretary-general Lee Ying-yuan (李應元), former DPP legislator Huang Chien-huei (黃劍輝) and Taiwan Association of University Professors president Chen Yi-shen (陳儀深).
The group also promised to hold a smaller event in Kaohsiung tomorrow, saying it would either be a sit-in or a speech at the Kaohsiung Arena to raise awareness against the ECFA and drum up support for a referendum.
While the DPP has not officially endorsed any of the rallies, DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday she was not against street protests, but she said any rally must be effective and must help the public understand the severity of the issue.
“Popular movements are a natural consequence of a government that forces through its decisions unilaterally without first reaching a public consensus,” Tsai said. “We expect this to continue.”
Organizers said that while they have not settled on the format of the May 20 rally, it would mostly take the form of a protest or possibly a sit-in.
In response to the number of pro-independence organizations holding protests over the next two months, Hsieh said that even more “grassroots lectures and popular movements should be held.”
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:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater