The Taiwan Jury Association and political advocates yesterday criticized the government’s failure to invite the Dalai Lama for a visit, while questioning whether President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) has been stopped by her “fear of China.”
The nation’s previous directly elected presidents have all invited the Tibetan spiritual leader to visit except for Tsai, who has been in office for three years, association founder Jerry Cheng (鄭文龍) told a news conference in Taipei.
“Why can the Dalai Lama not visit Taiwan now? President Tsai, is it because of your cowardice and fear of China?” he asked.
Photo: Liao Chen-huei, Taipei Times
Cheng also requested that other potential presidential candidates clarify their stance on the issue, especially former premier William Lai (賴清德), who is Tsai’s sole challenger for the Democratic Progressive Party’s nomination.
“Lai, if you are elected president next year, would you be willing to invite the Dalai Lama to visit Taiwan?” Cheng asked.
He also called for answers to the question from “pro-China” Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential hopefuls Hon Hai Precision Industry Co chairman Terry Gou (郭台銘), Legislator Wang Jin-pyng (王金平), Kaohsiung Mayor Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) and former New Taipei City mayor Eric Chu (朱立倫).
“On the world stage, Taiwan does not often receive focused media attention, but we can put more effort into human rights and other important international issues by forging a stronger alliance with Tibet and the Uighur people of East Turkestan,” Cheng said. “Through these endeavors, Taiwan is also linked with North American and European nations.”
“These can create greater visibility for us and highlight the fact that Taiwan is a sovereign and independent country,” Cheng added.
The Dalai Lama visited Taiwan in 1997, 2001 and 2009 during the presidencies of Lee Teng-hui (李登輝), Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九).
Other association members urged the government to issue the invitation quickly, as the Dalai Lama is growing older and has been less able to undertake long journeys.
Lawmakers in March joined the Tibetan community and organizations in launching a petition to ask the government to issue the Dalai Lama a formal invitation.
Taiwanese National Congress convener Ted Lau (劉重義) said that most Taiwanese have a distorted view of Tibetan history from the former KMT educational system and Beijing.
“Tibet was never a part of China and the Republic of China [ROC] never had administrative power over Tibet,” Lau said. “Therefore, Tsai as our nation’s leader should announce to the world that Tibet, and also Mongolia, are not territories of the ROC.”
“However, Tsai after assuming office has been afflicted with fear of China,” Lau added. “We hope that Lai would take a strong stance and make this clear to the world.”
Dawa Tsering, top envoy for the exiled Tibetan government in Taiwan, in March said that the Dalai Lama has expressed the desire to visit Taiwan again, but it would be up to the government to decide.
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
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:
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
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