Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers yesterday continued their occupation of the legislative floor, the third day of a planned six-day action to boycott a vote on a national referendum on the controversial Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in Gongliao District (貢寮), New Taipei City (新北市).
The DPP have demanded that the government halt construction of the plant immediately in response to the findings of various surveys that show more than 70 percent of the pubic are opposed to the plant.
Due to the high threshold required for a referendum to be valid, the question asked in the referendum — “Do you agree that the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant should be halted and that it not become operational (你是否同意核四廠停止興建不得運轉)?” — has been seen by some members of the opposition as a deliberate tactic by the government to ensure the referendum motion fails and construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant continues.
Photo: AFP / Mandy Cheng
DPP caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) said DPP lawmakers have all canceled their scheduled itineraries in constituencies until Tuesday because “we must do our utmost to stop the vote.”
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is hoping that the motion on the proposed referendum will clear the legislature before the new legislative session begins next month to prevent the “seven-in-one” local elections, slated to be held nationwide at the end of next year, from complicating the referendum issue.
KMT caucus whip Lin Hung-chih (林鴻池) said KMT lawmakers will check on the situation inside the legislative building from time to time according to a shift roster.
“We will try to recover the speaker’s podium if we have a chance,” Lin said.
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