Facing criticism for breaking a promise to preserve agricultural land and safeguard farmers’ rights and their property, Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) yesterday demanded that senior officials follow his instructions in dealing with land expropriation for development projects.
Government officials “shall refrain from designating fertile farmland for development use as much as possible” and “take into account the dissenting opinions of landowners affected by development projects,” Wu was quoted by Executive Yuan Spokesman Philip Yang (楊永明) as saying.
The issue of farmland expropriation was placed on the agenda for the meeting after farming rights advocacy groups announced that they would stage an overnight rally in front of the Presidential Office next weekend to protest against a series of development projects.
Four projects have drawn particular attention to the problem, including a plan to expropriate 447 hectares of farmland in Jhubei (竹北), Hsinchu County, for the expansion of a campus at National Chiao Tung University and the establishment of a park for the integrated circuit design industry, and a plan to turn 362 hectares of farmland in Wanbao (灣寶) and Houlong (後龍) in Miaoli County, into a science park.
Next weekend’s rally is expected to involve residents from Dapu (大埔) in Miaoli County’s Jhunan Township (竹南), whose farmland was seized for the expansion of the Hsinchu Science Park, as well as farmers from Siangsihliao (相思寮) and neighboring regions, whose land has designated for the fourth-stage expansion of the -Central Taiwan Science Park.
At the press conference, Construction and Planning Agency Director Yeh Shih-wen (葉世文) dismissed media reports in which some residents of Dapu and Siangsihliao are reported to have complained about Wu’s failure to live up to promises he made last year to preserve their households and provide them with new plots of land in return for the seizure of their paddy fields.
“There were a few isolated cases. In the Dapu case, out of a total of 24 households affected by the project, we have settled the issue with 20,” Yeh said.
Yeh said the Ministry of the Interior, under which his agency falls, rejected the Wanbao project on May 25 and has demanded the Hsinchu County Government hold talks with Jhubei residents who remain divided over the project.
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:
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