President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) inaugural address emphasized regional and cross-strait stability, active participation in international trade deals and deepening relationships with democracies such as the US, Japan and European nations, academics said, adding that Tsai was sending a message to Washington and Tokyo, calling on them to take Taiwan more seriously.
Taiwan Association of University Professors secretary-general Hsu Wen-tang (許文堂) — commenting on Tsai not affirming the so-called “1992 consensus” — said there were indeed talks between then-chairman of the Straits Exchange Foundation Koo Chen-fu (辜振甫) and then-chairman of China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits Wang Daohan (汪道涵), and that is why Tsai said the cross-strait interaction of the time is a “historical fact.”
However, the term “1992 consensus,” coined by former Mainland Affairs Council chairman Su Chi (蘇起) for then-president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) use, is fake, and mostly not accepted by Taiwanese, Hsu said.
“Tsai’s phrasing of the cross-strait relationship [in the speech] was intended to not allow China room to make a fuss,” Hsu said.
The “1992 consensus” refers to a tacit understanding between the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Chinese government that both sides of the Strait acknowledge there is “one China,” with each side having its own interpretation of what “China” means.
Hsu said Tsai’s message that she intended to further develop relationships with the US, Japan and European countries and cooperate with them based on common values was a call to the international community and democracies around the world to see Taiwan as a crucial partner.
Tsai stressed the Republic of China’s constitutional order as a message to China that there is no room to bargain over sovereignty, Hsu said, adding that Tsai is also expected to bolster cooperation with the US in the South China Sea and uphold freedom of navigation in those waters.
Chen Mu-min (陳牧民), chairman of the Graduate Institute of International Politics at National Chung Hsing University, said the highlight of the diplomatic policies in Tsai’s speech was the importance placed on Taiwan’s connections with the international community.
While former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) emphasized “Taiwanese consciousness” and Ma focused on cross-strait peace, the new government has shown that it plans to improve ties in the region by participating in Asia-Pacific activities and building an economic community to scale the nation’s economy upward, Chen Mu-min said.
Tsai highlighted that Taiwan would be a staunch guardian of regional peace while deepening its relationship with the US and Japan based on the universal values of peace, democracy, liberty and human rights, Chen Mu-min said.
“She also asserted that Taiwan would not be a troublemaker in the South and East China seas,” he 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:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
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