Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei mayoral candidate Sean Lien’s (連勝文) camp yesterday released a video of his wife, Patty Tsai (蔡依珊), recalling the time Lien was shot while stumping for KMT New Taipei City Councilor Chen Hung-yuan (陳鴻源) four years ago.
Lin Cheng-wei (林正偉) shot Lien at close range, with the bullet entering the left side of Lien’s face and exiting near his right temple.
Afterward, Lin said he had mistaken Lien for Chen. Lin was sentenced to life imprisonment in January last year.
In the video, Tsai says that despite his brush with death, Lien had not been simmering with resentment after the incident, nor had he become angry and misanthropic.
“That is why I like him, because he has been a sunshine boy,” she says.
The video then shows Tsai saying she believes God had a reason for helping Lien survive the shooting and appealing to Taipei voters to give him a chance.
“He always leaves a good impression on anyone who talks to him because he is very sincere,” she says.
Earlier in the day, when asked about the shooting, Lien said he would be lying if he said he was not haunted by the incident, adding that it had been life-changing.
“I began to think about what I could do to give back to society. Today [the anniversary of the shooting] really means a lot to me,” he said.
In other developments, Lien said he plans to donate the subsidy he will receive from the government for his votes in Saturday’s election to charity.
Lien made the remark when asked to confirm a report in the Chinese-language Next Magazine that he would announce a donation from his personal assets ahead of Saturday’s election to boost his chances.
“It [the magazine] got it wrong. We are planning to donate the NT$30 per vote subsidy,” Lien said as he canvassed for support at the Zhengyi Public Housing Complex (正義國宅) in the city’s Daan District (大安) last night.
China has reserved offshore airspace in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported yesterday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. These alerts, known as Notice to Air Missions (Notams), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert is
NAMING SPAT: The foreign ministry called on Denmark to propose an acceptable solution to the erroneous nationality used for Taiwanese on residence permits Taiwan has revoked some privileges for Danish diplomatic staff over a Danish permit that lists “Taiwan” as “China,” Eric Huang (黃鈞耀), head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of European Affairs, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday. Reporters asked Huang whether the Danish government had responded to the ministry’s request that it correct the nationality on Danish residence permits of Taiwanese, which has been listed as “China” since 2024. Taiwan’s representative office in Denmark continues to communicate with the Danish government, and the ministry has revoked some privileges previously granted to Danish representatives in Taiwan and would continue to review
More than 6,000 Taiwanese students have participated in exchange programs in China over the past two years, despite the Mainland Affairs Council’s (MAC) “orange light” travel advisory, government records showed. The MAC’s publicly available registry showed that Taiwanese college and university students who went on exchange programs across the Strait numbered 3,592 and 2,966 people respectively. The National Immigration Agency data revealed that 2,296 and 2,551 Chinese students visited Taiwan for study in the same two years. A review of the Web sites of publicly-run universities and colleges showed that Taiwanese higher education institutions continued to recruit students for Chinese educational programs without
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
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