Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday criticized the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) “mudslinging campaign strategy” and said her lawyers are considering whether to take legal action against the KMT.
She also urged voters to oust the KMT at the ballot box.
Over the past week, the KMT and various members have repeatedly accused Tsai real-estate speculation, with some calling the DPP chairperson and her family “a group of thieves,” even though Tsai and the DPP have provided official land registration records to show that the KMT’s claims are false.
Photo: Chang Chia-ming, Taipei Times
“I would like to take this opportunity to tell [KMT] Chairperson Eric Chu (朱立倫) that although the KMT is not doing well now, and the election is not looking good for them, a party should still maintain its morals in difficult times, so that it would have another chance to rise again with the public’s support,” Tsai said.
She made the remarks in response to reporters’ requests for a comment on the allegations before she appeared at a rally for New Power Party legislative candidate Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌).
“It is really not good for the KMT if it allows people who are without credibility and questionable themselves to continue to make false allegations,” she said, adding: “Our lawyers are mulling legal action.”
Tsai’s appearance at Huang’s rally in front of the railway station in New Taipei City’s Sijhih District (汐止) came four days after the DPP’s Central Standing Committee passed a motion to support non-DPP candidates who share similar ideologies in constituencies where the party has no nominee.
Speaking to a cheering crowd, Tsai urged voters to cast their ballot for president for her and Huang for legislator. She also called on them punish the KMT for its mudslinging campaign strategy.
“In the 2012 presidential election, the KMT has employed the muddling strategy, though it has won, the people have lost,” Tsai said. “This time, if the KMT is still playing the same trick, let’s make them lose, let’s make them lose thoroughly.”
The KMT has to lose because if all a party can do in a campaign is sling muck, then it is not a party that has the ability to run a nation, she said.
In comparison, the DPP has established a team of hundreds of experts in different fields to develop policy proposals to solve the problems facing Taiwan, Tsai said.
“The DPP is confident, and determined to make changes for Taiwan so that everyone will have a good life and feel that being Taiwanese is something to be proud of,” Tsai said.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
The eastern extension of the Taipei MRT Red Line could begin operations as early as late June, the Taipei Department of Rapid Transit Systems said yesterday. Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said it is considering offering one month of free rides on the new section to mark its opening. Construction progress on the 1.4km extension, which is to run from the current terminal Xiangshan Station to a new eastern terminal, Guangci/Fengtian Temple Station, was 90.6 percent complete by the end of last month, the department said in a report to the Taipei City Council's Transportation Committee. While construction began in October 2016 with an
NON-RED SUPPLY: Boosting the nation’s drone industry is becoming increasingly urgent as China’s UAV dominance could become an issue in a crisis, an analyst said Taiwan’s drone exports to Europe grew 41.7-fold from 2024 to last year, with demand from Ukraine’s fight against Russian aggression the most likely driver of growth, a study showed. The Institute for Democracy, Society and Emerging Technology (DSET) in a statement on Wednesday said it found that many of Taiwan’s uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) sales were from Poland and the Czech Republic. These countries likely transferred the drones to Ukraine to aid it in its fight against the Russian invasion that started in 2022, it said. Despite the gains, Taiwan is not the dominant drone exporter to these markets, ranking second and fourth
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comment last year on Tokyo’s potential reaction to a Taiwan-China conflict has forced Beijing to rewrite its invasion plans, a retired Japanese general said. Takaichi told the Diet on Nov. 7 last year that a Chinese naval blockade or military attack on Taiwan could constitute a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, potentially allowing Tokyo to exercise its right to collective self-defense. Former Japan Ground Self-Defense Force general Kiyofumi Ogawa said in a recent speech that the remark has been interpreted as meaning Japan could intervene in the early stages of a Taiwan Strait conflict, undermining China’s previous assumptions
RSS