The father of Taiwanese taekwondo athlete Yang Shu-chun (楊淑君) demanded that the government seek justice for his daughter after allegations that she had used extra sensors in her socks led to her disqualification from the Asian Games on Wednesday.
“The whole thing is utterly unacceptable,” Yang Chin-hsing (楊進興) said.
Yang’s mother said the phone at the family’s home was ringing off the hook with calls offering sympathy and support for her daughter.
Until Sports Affairs Council (SAC) Deputy Minister Steven Chen (陳士魁) visited the family at their home in Taipei County yesterday afternoon to apologize on behalf of another SAC deputy minister, Chen Hsien-chung (陳顯宗), for having previously suggested that Taiwan could only “swallow” Wednesday’s ruling, the mother said there had been nothing forthcoming from any government agency since the incident took place.
According to her father, Yang Shu-chun had considered retiring from the sport after failing to win a medal at the Beijing Olympics in 2008, and had only continued after he persuaded her to do so. Neither of them expected something like this to happen during the Asian Games.
Yang Shu-chun was quoted by her mother as being devastated, calling home five or six times on Wednesday in tears, saying that all the hard work she had put in over the last 10 years had just gone up in smoke.
Yang Chin-hsing said he strongly suspected China had a hand in the incident. He said the semi-final was originally set for yesterday, but had been changed to Wednesday at the last moment, giving Yang very little time to register.
Her mother said that Yang Shu-chun had put everything into her training. She said over the last couple of years the athlete had been approached on several occasions by companies wanting her to endorse their products, but had turned them down because she wanted to concentrate on her preparations for the Asian Games.
“The whole family is upset by what has happened,” the mother said.
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
NUMBERS IMBALANCE: More than 4 million Taiwanese have visited China this year, while only about half a million Chinese have visited here Beijing has yet to respond to Taiwan’s requests for negotiation over matters related to the recovery of cross-strait tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. Taiwan’s tourism authority issued the statement after Chinese-language daily the China Times reported yesterday that the government’s policy of banning group tours to China does not stop Taiwanese from visiting the country. As of October, more than 4.2 million had traveled to China this year, exceeding last year. Beijing estimated the number of Taiwanese tourists in China could reach 4.5 million this year. By contrast, only 500,000 Chinese tourists are expected in Taiwan, the report said. The report
RSS