Former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) could be one of the speakers at next week’s protest against the government’s plan to sign an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with China.
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) announced on Wednesday that it would hold a massive rally in Taipei City on June 26 to demand the government put its proposed ECFA to a referendum.
Citing a sharp divide in polls over the controversial trade agreement, the DPP is set to unveil a new referendum proposal asking voters whether they agreed with an ECFA at the rally.
The DPP’s standing committee is expected to give the go ahead tomorrow for the rally and to authorize the DPP’s ECFA response team to launch a mobilization order asking tens of thousands of party supporters to congregate in Taipei City.
Party sources told the Central News Agency that the protest could be divided into two routes that would later congregate on Ketagalan Boulevard in front of the Presidential Office.
While the agency reported that as many as 100,000 are expected to attend the rally, DPP ECFA response team spokesperson Julian Kuo (郭正亮) told the Taipei Times earlier yesterday that the number could reach 200,000.
DPP Deputy Secretary-General Kao Chien-chih (高建智) said the party would invite Lee to attend the rally, along with a number of pro-independence organizations and the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU).
TSU Chairperson Huang Kun-huei (黃昆輝), former presidential adviser Koo Kwang-ming (辜寬敏) and a number of other pro-independence heavyweights are expected to hold a joint press conference today in support of the rally.
The June 26 protest will be the biggest rally to date against an ECFA and in support of a referendum being held on the issue.
In related news, DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday downplayed comments reportedly made by former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) that Tsai would be the DPP’s candidate for the 2012 presidential election.
Tsai said she had no comment, adding that the DPP was firmly focused on the year-end special municipality elections.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CNA
Prosecutors in New Taipei City yesterday indicted 31 individuals affiliated with the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) for allegedly forging thousands of signatures in recall campaigns targeting three Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers. The indictments stem from investigations launched earlier this year after DPP lawmakers Su Chiao-hui (蘇巧慧) and Lee Kuen-cheng (李坤城) filed criminal complaints accusing campaign organizers of submitting false signatures in recall petitions against them. According to the New Taipei District Prosecutors Office, a total of 2,566 forged recall proposal forms in the initial proposer petition were found during the probe. Among those
ECHOVIRUS 11: The rate of enterovirus infections in northern Taiwan increased last week, with a four-year-old girl developing acute flaccid paralysis, the CDC said Two imported cases of chikungunya fever were reported last week, raising the total this year to 13 cases — the most for the same period in 18 years, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday. The two cases were a Taiwanese and a foreign national who both arrived from Indonesia, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The 13 cases reported this year are the most for the same period since chikungunya was added to the list of notifiable communicable diseases in October 2007, she said, adding that all the cases this year were imported, including 11 from
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) today condemned the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) after the Czech officials confirmed that Chinese agents had surveilled Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) during her visit to Prague in March last year. Czech Military Intelligence director Petr Bartovsky yesterday said that Chinese operatives had attempted to create the conditions to carry out a demonstrative incident involving Hsiao, going as far as to plan a collision with her car. Hsiao was vice president-elect at the time. The MAC said that it has requested an explanation and demanded a public apology from Beijing. The CCP has repeatedly ignored the desires