A group of pro-localization organizations yesterday called for Premier William Lai (賴清德) to lend his support to a proposed referendum to have the national team compete in the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics as “Taiwan” rather than “Chinese Taipei.”
China was extremely irrational in using the name rectification campaign initiated by Taiwanese civic groups as a pretext to meddle in sports events, Taiwan Society chairman Chang Yeh-sen (張葉森) said, referring to the East Asian Olympic Committee’s (EAOC) decision on Tuesday to revoke Taichung’s right to host the first East Asian Youth Games next year.
The decision was taken in a vote reportedly called by China’s representatives due to the name rectification campaign.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
Taiwan, an EAOC member, voted against the motion, while Japan abstained, the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee (CTOC) said, adding that the EAOC includes Taiwan, China, South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Macau, North Korea and Mongolia.
Lai has previously described himself to the legislature as “a pragmatic political worker for Taiwanese independence,” Union of Taiwan Teachers chairwoman Hsiao Hsiao-ling (蕭曉玲) said, calling on Lai to demonstrate his pragmatism.
As the governing party, the Democratic Progressive Party should use the public support that it has at this critical moment, she said, urging candidates running in the Nov. 24 elections to also support the campaign by helping to collect signatures.
Taiwanese should bravely let the world know that “Taiwan is Taiwan,” not part of China’s territory or “Chinese Taipei,” a moniker that the nation has been forced to use in international competitions since 1981, Central Taiwan Society chairman Liao I-en (廖宜恩) said.
The campaign’s Web site yesterday showed that it had garnered 89,573 signatures as of Wednesday.
It needs to collect 280,000 signatures by the end of next month to meet the second-stage threshold.
On Tuesday, CTOC vice chairman Tsai Szu-chueh (蔡賜爵) said that the public has the right to call for a referendum, but the CTOC could not play a role in or advocate for such a move.
Tsai declined to comment on whether a referendum would infringe on Olympic Charter guidelines.
A CTOC official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that Olympic guidelines do not forbid Taiwan from holding a referendum on its name.
Additional reporting by CNA
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
US President Donald Trump said "it’s up to" Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be "very unhappy" with a change in the "status quo," the New York Times said in an interview published yesterday. Xi "considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing," Trump told the newspaper on Wednesday. "But I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that," he added. "I hope he doesn’t do that." Trump made the comments in
Tourism in Kenting fell to a historic low for the second consecutive year last year, impacting hotels and other local businesses that rely on a steady stream of domestic tourists, the latest data showed. A total of 2.139 million tourists visited Kenting last year, down slightly from 2.14 million in 2024, the data showed. The number of tourists who visited the national park on the Hengchun Peninsula peaked in 2015 at 8.37 million people. That number has been below 2.2 million for two years, although there was a spike in October last year due to multiple long weekends. The occupancy rate for hotels
A cold surge advisory was today issued for 18 cities and counties across Taiwan, with temperatures of below 10°C forecast during the day and into tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. New Taipei City, Taipei, Taoyuan and Hsinchu, Miaoli and Yilan counties are expected to experience sustained temperatures of 10°C or lower, the CWA said. Temperatures are likely to temporarily drop below 10°C in most other areas, except Taitung, Pingtung, Penghu and Lienchiang (Matsu) counties, CWA data showed. The cold weather is being caused by a strong continental cold air mass, combined with radiative cooling, a process in which heat escapes from
RSS