The pan-green camp yesterday criticized the 19-point recommendation reached by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) on Sunday, saying it showed contempt for the legislature and the mainstream opinions of the 23 million Taiwanese.
The recommendation, reached and announced at the ninth KMT-CCP forum that was concluded on Sunday in Nanning, China, listed the implementation of the cross-strait service trade agreement as a top priority.
“While the Democratic Progressive Party [DPP] has always supported free trade, we argue that the unfair pact poses a ‘clear and immediate’ danger to small and medium enterprises in Taiwan,” DPP Department of China Affairs director Honigmann Hong (洪財隆) said in a press release issued late on Sunday.
The forum’s recommendation ignores the rapidly decreasing support for the pact among the Taiwanese public over the fear of the harm it could cause the local service sectors, Hong said.
He reiterated that the DPP is demanding that the agreement be renegotiated because of the lack of transparency during the initial talks, as well as the failure to consult with the affected sectors.
According to a legislative resolution resulting from cross-party negotiations, the pact is scheduled to be screened and voted on clause-by-clause this week in the legislature.
The establishment of the forum, which began in 2005, was the CCP’s and the KMT’s attempt to bypass the previous DPP administration and make decisions on cross-strait relations a party-to-party mechanism that excluded the public, Hong said.
“I don’t think [the forum] can speak for Taiwanese,” he said.
While the forum recommended holding a joint discussion on “linking both sides’ efforts to participate in Asia-Pacific economic integration,” the director said it was Beijing that had blocked Taipei’s efforts to join integration in the past.
Hong added that President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration has been inconsistent in its stance on a number of experimental free-trade zones on China’s southeastern coast, with the Mainland Affairs Council de-emphasizing Beijing’s promotion of the zones due to their “strong political implications.”
However, the KMT, of which Ma is chairman, has been encouraging Taiwanese businesspeople to invest in the zones this year, he said.
Comments by Yu Zhengsheng (俞正聲), chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Committee, which blamed “a group of Taiwanese independence supporters” for stalling the ratification of the service trade pact in the legislature, said Beijing “did not understand Taiwan at all,” DPP Legislator Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) said.
More than 70 percent of respondents in most public opinion polls oppose the pact and only a handful of KMT lawmakers support it, Lee said.
Throughout its history, the forum has shown Taiwanese nothing except how high-ranking KMT officials fawn over Beijing for personal gain — be it financial or political — Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) Chairman Huang Kun-huei (黃昆輝) said yesterday.
The forum has been a platform for the KMT’s strategy of “collaboration with the CCP in containing Taiwan,” through which politicians from both sides of the Taiwan Strait exchange favors without regard for the Taiwanese public’s interests, Huang said.
With the emphasis on the cross-strait service trade agreement, the forum has now become a tool with which China can pressure the Ma administration, he 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
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday said it opposes the introduction of migrant workers from India until a mechanism is in place to prevent workers from absconding. Minister of Labor Hung Sun-han (洪申翰) on Thursday told the Legislative Yuan that the first group of migrant workers from India could be introduced as early as this year, as part of a government program. The caucus’ opposition to the policy is based on the assessment that “the risk is too high,” KMT caucus secretary-general Lin Pei-hsiang (林沛祥) said. Taiwan has a serious and long-standing problem of migrant workers absconding from their contracts, indicating that
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