Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) is scheduled to meet with groups opposing nuclear power tomorrow to address their concerns over the disposal of nuclear waste, Executive Yuan spokesman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) said yesterday.
Cheng said that Vice Premier Mao Chi-kuo (毛治國), who is the head of a special office dealing with issues related to the fate of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, Minister of Economic Affairs Chang Chia-juch (張家祝), along with several academics and experts, would attend the meeting.
Kuo Ching-lin (郭慶霖), chief executive of the Northern Coast Anti-Nuclear Action Alliance, said his group plans to make several requests during the meeting, including that the government stop nuclear power production and halt the operations of the first, second and third nuclear power plants if it cannot deal properly with radioactive waste.
Photo: Chen Chih-chu, Taipei Times
It will also demand that a fund be established for residents in areas near nuclear power plants, to be used for compensation and restoration fees.
The group will also ask for an investigation into the flaws and corruption related to all the nation’s nuclear power plants, Kuo added.
He said other groups that will attend the planned meeting include the Green Citizens’ Action Alliance and organizations formed by those living in areas around nuclear waste dumps, such as the Orchid Island Tribal Culture Foundation, and near nuclear plants.
The Executive Yuan’s plan for the meeting came a day after President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), Jiang and Chang met at the Presidential Office with representatives of Mom Loves Taiwan, an association of mothers established to monitor the use of nuclear power, for a hearing on nuclear safety.
Ma said in an article posed on his Facebook page yesterday that it was a good start for him to meet with members of Mom Loves Taiwan, as the meeting allowed the truth to become clearer through debate and dialogue.
The meeting lasted for three hours, exceeding the originally scheduled 80 minutes, he wrote.
The president said that experts and academics from the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the Atomic Energy Council and Taiwan Power Co explained the current nuclear safety situation and future plans to the 12 representatives.
Establishing a safe, reliable, low-carbon and green nuclear-free homeland with sufficient power supplies at reasonable prices is the country’s eventual goal, the president said.
He added that the government would continue talks with the public to allow more people access to open and transparent information so that they can make informed decisions.
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:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
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