Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Cheng Li-chiun (鄭麗君) yesterday blasted the Atomic Energy Council (AEC) and Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) after a report confirmed Taipower’s serious nuclear waste repackaging error on Lanyu (蘭嶼), also known as Orchid Island.
“If the AEC and Taipower fail to handle nuclear waste well, nuclear safety in Taiwan is over,” Cheng told a press conference in the legislature.
Cheng on Oct. 25 accused Taipower of malpractice in its examination and repackaging of corroded waste drums at the storage facility on the island as the process was carried out in the open, which could lead to radiation leakage.
The storage facility, built in 1982 by the government without prior consultation and communication with Lanyu residents, stopped receiving nuclear waste in 1996.
The AEC denied Cheng’s accusation the same day, saying the photos the lawmakers showed at a press conference were “old photographs” and there were no safety concerns because the entire process was carried out in an enclosed area.
However, an AEC report on the incident released on Wednesday confirmed the error and the council ruled it a fourth-degree violation and reprimanded Taipower.
AEC Minister Tsai Chuen-horng (蔡春鴻) apologized for the malpractice in a budget-screening session of the legislature’s Education and Culture Committee yesterday.
Tsai was lambasted by the lawmakers for covering up Taipower’s mistakes, with Cheng saying that the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant should be halted since the AEC and Taipower have raised doubts about their capability to ensure safety.
The committee reached a consensus to freeze one-third of the AEC’s general administration budget and demanded that the council conduct a thorough investigation of the incident, as well as monitor local residents’ health.
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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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching