The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday said it would carefully review the names of a pair of party institutions that handle Chinese affairs without succumbing to pressure from Beijing.
The party made the comments in response to a story published in yesterday’s edition of the Chinese-language Apple Daily, which reported that Beijing had pressured the DPP to drop “China” from the names of two soon-to-be-established departments and use “cross-strait” instead.
In a bid to forge a better understanding of China, DPP Chairman Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) said the party would reinstate the Department of China Affairs and establish a Chinese Affairs Committee, which would include academics, party officials and civic groups.
DPP spokesperson Lin Chun-hsien (林俊憲) said the party would not necessarily change the name, because “if all the countries in the world call the country China, why can’t Taiwan do the same?”
While some academics did recommend changing the name, Lin said “the DPP did not see this as pressure, nor could Beijing pressure the DPP to change the name.”
Speaking to reporters in Taoyuan County yesterday, Su denied there was any Chinese pressure and said the DPP would stand firm on its position.
Former DPP chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said on the sidelines of an event in Miaoli City that this was not the first time Beijing had pressured the DPP about nomenclature, adding that the party “should stand firm on its position.”
DPP Legislator Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said the party should be open-minded and pragmatic.
There is no need to change the name of the Department of China Affairs to the Department of Cross-Strait Affairs because the department was reinstated, Lin said.
“The DPP should be open-minded and the terms of China and cross-strait could co-exist since its goal is to increase bilateral engagement. Nomenclature is a secondary issue,” Lin Chia-lung said.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
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