Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) yesterday said that his discourse on cross-strait relations has always been clear and his statement that “the two sides of the [Taiwan] Strait are one family” remains his fundamental stance.
Wu Tsu-chia (吳子嘉), a commentator who runs news Web site my-formosa.com, on Saturday said that Ko’s discourse on cross-strait relations has been vacillating and lacks a “fundamental spirit.”
When asked by reporters to comment on Wu’s remarks, Ko said: “My attitude toward cross-strait relations is very certain.”
Photo: Huang Yao-cheng, Taipei Times
Many have criticized him for meeting with politicians from different camps, and he used to wonder why, but he has now reached an answer, Ko said.
“I worked at intensive care units and emergency rooms as a doctor, and doctors have a trait: We never get to choose our patients,” Ko said. “We cannot ask patients to come in only if they are affiliated with the Chinese Nationalist Party [KMT] or Democratic Progressive Party.”
He has no difficulty speaking with politicians from the pan-blue or the pan-green camps, Ko said, adding that having “practical dialogues” is his specialty, because his experience as a surgeon has made him practical and willing to listen to different opinions.
“The statement that ‘the two sides of the [Taiwan] Strait are one family’ is still a fundamental element [of my cross-strait discourse] for the time being. It does not pertain to politics, but rather to cultural and economic exchanges, as well as exchanges between private actors and between cities,” he said.
“The nation’s future cannot rely on others’ friendliness toward us, so economic capability and national defense must be bolstered while expressing our friendliness,” Ko said.
“I do not advocate the two sides of the Strait talking tough to each other and causing relations to become more tense, which is what we see now and I do not think that is a good situation,” he added.
Separately yesterday, Ko presented two new spokespeople for his campaign office for the Nov. 24 nine-in-one local elections.
Tsai Chun-wei (蔡峻維) and Yang Sheng (楊笙) are both in their 20s and were chosen through an open audition, Ko said.
Tsai and Yang are to first work as interns alongside office spokesman Lin Hsiao-chi (林筱淇) and Taipei Mayoral Office spokesman Lin Kun-feng (林昆鋒), who is to leave his post and join the campaign team as head spokesman next month, the office said.
Taipei, New Taipei City, Keelung and Taoyuan would issue a decision at 8pm on whether to cancel work and school tomorrow due to forecasted heavy rain, Keelung Mayor Hsieh Kuo-liang (謝國樑) said today. Hsieh told reporters that absent some pressing reason, the four northern cities would announce the decision jointly at 8pm. Keelung is expected to receive between 300mm and 490mm of rain in the period from 2pm today through 2pm tomorrow, Central Weather Administration data showed. Keelung City Government regulations stipulate that school and work can be canceled if rain totals in mountainous or low-elevation areas are forecast to exceed 350mm in
EVA Airways president Sun Chia-ming (孫嘉明) and other senior executives yesterday bowed in apology over the death of a flight attendant, saying the company has begun improving its health-reporting, review and work coordination mechanisms. “We promise to handle this matter with the utmost responsibility to ensure safer and healthier working conditions for all EVA Air employees,” Sun said. The flight attendant, a woman surnamed Sun (孫), died on Friday last week of undisclosed causes shortly after returning from a work assignment in Milan, Italy, the airline said. Chinese-language media reported that the woman fell ill working on a Taipei-to-Milan flight on Sept. 22
COUNTERMEASURE: Taiwan was to implement controls for 47 tech products bound for South Africa after the latter downgraded and renamed Taipei’s ‘de facto’ offices The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is still reviewing a new agreement proposed by the South African government last month to regulate the status of reciprocal representative offices, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. Asked about the latest developments in a year-long controversy over Taiwan’s de facto representative office in South Africa, Lin during a legislative session said that the ministry was consulting with legal experts on the proposed new agreement. While the new proposal offers Taiwan greater flexibility, the ministry does not find it acceptable, Lin said without elaborating. The ministry is still open to resuming retaliatory measures against South
1.4nm WAFERS: While TSMC is gearing up to expand its overseas production, it would also continue to invest in Taiwan, company chairman and CEO C.C. Wei said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) has applied for permission to construct a new plant in the Central Taiwan Science Park (中部科學園區), which it would use for the production of new high-speed wafers, the National Science and Technology Council said yesterday. The council, which supervises three major science parks in Taiwan, confirmed that the Central Taiwan Science Park Bureau had received an application on Friday from TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, to commence work on the new A14 fab. A14 technology, a 1.4 nanometer (nm) process, is designed to drive artificial intelligence transformation by enabling faster computing and greater power
RSS