The establishment of a medical team with credibility and expertise to look after imprisoned former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) would be in the interests of the country and society, former Democratic Progressive Party chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday.
Tsai made the remarks on the sidelines of a DPP event in Miaoli City in response to media inquiries following reports on Chen’s ill health.
Chen is currently serving a 17-and-a-half-year sentence in Taipei Prison for corruption. Concerned over the conditions of his confinement, and mental and physical condition, two US lawmakers last week submitted a report to the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission calling for immediate medical parole for Chen.
Photo: CNA
Founder of the Human Rights Action Center, John Healey, has also recently written an open letter to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) appealing for better healthcare and cell conditions for Chen.
Tsai yesterday urged the Ma administration to “seriously consider” the establishment of a credible medical team to conduct physiological and psychological examinations on Chen.
The government should take the former president’s health and the medical care he receives seriously, Tsai said.
Meanwhile, Tsai, in an interview with the Hong Kong-based Chinese-language Apple Daily, published yesterday, reiterated that she does not rule out visiting China if there are no preconditions.
If she could visit China the same way she visited Japan and the US, with no conditions attached, “Why not [make the trip]?” Tsai said.
“But I’m not going anywhere as you can see, which tells you that the problem is on the Chinese side,” she added.
Speaking on the issue of the democratic movement in Hong Kong, Tsai said both Hong Kong and Taiwan face the same issue.
“We both have to deal with the Chinese Communist Party,” she said.
Respect should be the key word in China’s interaction with Hong Kong and Taiwan, Tsai said, adding that Beijing did not respect Taiwan, as could be seen from its interference and coercion of Taiwanese society, and that its fingerprints had been everywhere on the election for Hong Kong’s chief executive.
“Beijing must respect democracy in Taiwan and Hong Kongers’ calls for direct elections and democracy,” she said.
Tsai, who represented the DPP in the presidential election in January, was still tight-lipped on whether she was considering running in the 2016 presidential election, but said that she would like to help establish and coordinate social movements in Taiwan.
The development of social movements would be the next important step in the democratic movement in Taiwan, Tsai said.
“As a politician, you have to participate in the movement. You have to be ready to help,” she said.
Taiwanese scientists have engineered plants that can capture about 50 percent more carbon dioxide and produce more than twice as many seeds as unmodified plants, a breakthrough they hope could one day help mitigate global warming and grow more food staples such as rice. If applied to major food crops, the new system could cut carbon emissions and raise yields “without additional equipment or labor costs,” Academia Sinica researcher and lead author the study Lu Kuan-jen (呂冠箴) said. Academia Sinica president James Liao (廖俊智) said that as humans emit 9.6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide compared with the 220 billion tonnes absorbed
The Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) Wanda-Zhonghe Line is 81.7 percent complete, with public opening targeted for the end of 2027, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said today. Surrounding roads are to be open to the public by the end of next year, Hou said during an inspection of construction progress. The 9.5km line, featuring nine underground stations and one depot, is expected to connect Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall Station to Chukuang Station in New Taipei City’s Jhonghe District (中和). All 18 tunnels for the line are complete, while the main structures of the stations and depot are mostly finished, he
Taipei is to implement widespread road closures around Taipei 101 on Friday to make way for large crowds during the Double Ten National Day celebration, the Taipei Department of Transportation said. A four-minute fireworks display is to be launched from the skyscraper, along with a performance by 500 drones flying in formation above the nearby Nanshan A21 site, starting at 10pm. Vehicle restrictions would occur in phases, they said. From 5pm to 9pm, inner lanes of Songshou Road between Taipei City Hall and Taipei 101 are to be closed, with only the outer lanes remaining open. Between 9pm and 9:40pm, the section is
China’s plan to deploy a new hypersonic ballistic missile at a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) base near Taiwan likely targets US airbases and ships in the western Pacific, but it would also present new threats to Taiwan, defense experts said. The New York Times — citing a US Department of Defense report from last year on China’s military power — on Monday reported in an article titled “The missiles threatening Taiwan” that China has stockpiled 3,500 missiles, 1.5 times more than four years earlier. Although it is unclear how many of those missiles were targeting Taiwan, the newspaper reported
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