Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) yesterday said he remains open to cooperation between the KMT and the People First Party (PFP) in next year’s presidential election, adding that he would “not give up until the end.”
Both parties are striving for the good of Taiwan and “the vendettas of the last generation” should be resolved through “sincere communication,” Chu said, adding that he has done a great deal of work “under the table,” which “must remain unknown” to the public.
Chu made the remarks in response to reporters’ questions regarding comments made on Monday by PFP presidential candidate James Soong (宋楚瑜), who said he has been “pining for the word” on a pan-blue alliance, but that the issue “depends on the KMT.”
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
According to the latest survey of presidential candidates released by the Taiwan Thinktank on Monday, Democratic Progressive Party Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) maintains her lead (47 percent) over both Soong and KMT presidential candidate Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱), with Hung at 16 percent and Soong at 13 percent.
Soong yesterday observed World Car-Free Day by riding public transportation, using the occasion to reiterate his stance on nuclear energy.
“A nuclear-free home is our common goal,” he said, promising, if elected, to conduct a new round of safety inspections at the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Gongliao District (貢寮).
Meanwhile, Hung yesterday unveiled her public housing policy.
If elected, she said she would dedicate an annual budget of between NT$20 billion and NT$25 billion (US$606.6 million and US$758.2 million) to set up a “National Housing Service,” which would provide housing subsidies to families with at least one income-earner regardless of the number of dependents.
Applicant priority would be determined through a system of eligibility “points” rather than lottery, with applicants’ personal accounts in the national labor pension fund providing the down payment for mortgages, Hung said.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
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