A coalition of environmental and Aboriginal campaigners yesterday staged a climate emergency demonstration in Taipei, calling on the government to hold a national conference to propose concrete climate action.
The march was mainly organized by the Air Clean Taiwan (ACT) to echo worldwide movements inspired by 16-year-old Swedish activist Greta Thunberg.
Participants started gathering outside the Legislative Yuan in Taipei at 1pm, and marched to the Democratic Progressive Party headquarters and the Executive Yuan to submit their appeals.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
Students and advocates in other cities also gathered to form the characters 1.5°C on campuses or in public squares for aerial photographs.
Global temperatures are likely to rise by 1.5°C by some time between 2030 and 2052 if global warming continues at its current rate, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned last year.
By 2030, human-induced carbon dioxide emissions would need to fall by about 45 percent from 2010 levels, to reach “net zero” by about 2050, it said.
To shape a carbon emission-free society for younger generations, the government should announce a state of emergency and convene a national conference in three months to tackle the effects of climate change, ACT chairman Yeh Guang-peng (葉光芃) told a news conference before the march.
“We hope that Aborigines in mountainous areas can pass every rainy season safely,” said As Li-i Mali, a Papora member of the Central Taiwan Pingpu Indigenous Groups Youth Alliance.
The Pingpu people, also known as plains Aborigines, have traditionally lived in Taiwan’s lowland areas, but have not yet obtained legal status.
Extreme rainfall last week caused landslides in Nantou County’s Renai Township (仁愛) and obstructed local roads to the point that children could not go to school and farmers could not transport their produce to markets, she said, asking if Taipei residents were aware of their predicament.
The 32-year-old — who is also known by her Chinese name, Su Hsin (蘇莘) — last year gave speeches at side events during the 24th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, along with the Taiwan Youth Climate Coalition.
“Aborigines would not overuse the land, cut down trees randomly or use pesticides on crops, because they are aware that they have to protect Mother Earth,” she said, adding that she hopes to share Aboriginal ideas about disaster prevention that put less emphasis on cement structures.
Former premier William Lai (賴清德) and former New Taipei City mayor Eric Chu (朱立倫) attended the march separately.
However, some people accused Lai of failing to protect Taoyuan’s algal reefs from a liquefied natural gas terminal project during his premiership.
AGING: While Japan has 22 submarines, Taiwan only operates four, two of which were commissioned by the US in 1945 and 1946, and transferred to Taiwan in 1973 Taiwan would need at least 12 submarines to reach modern fleet capabilities, CSBC Corp, Taiwan chairman Chen Cheng-hung (陳政宏) said in an interview broadcast on Friday, citing a US assessment. CSBC is testing the nation’s first indigenous defense submarine, the Hai Kun (海鯤, Narwhal), which is scheduled to be delivered to the navy next month or in July. The Hai Kun has completed torpedo-firing tests and is scheduled to undergo overnight sea trials, Chen said on an SET TV military affairs program. Taiwan would require at least 12 submarines to establish a modern submarine force after assessing the nation’s operational environment and defense
A white king snake that frightened passengers and caused a stir on a Taipei MRT train on Friday evening has been claimed by its owner, who would be fined, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. A person on Threads posted that he thought he was lucky to find an empty row of seats on Friday after boarding a train on the Bannan (Blue) Line, only to spot a white snake with black stripes after sitting down. Startled, he jumped up, he wrote, describing the encounter as “terrifying.” “Taipei’s rat control plan: Release snakes on the metro,” one person wrote in reply, referring
The coast guard today said that it had disrupted "illegal" operations by a Chinese research ship in waters close to the nation and driven it away, part of what Taipei sees a provocative pattern of China's stepped up maritime activities. The coast guard said that it on Thursday last week detected the Chinese ship Tongji (同濟號), which was commissioned only last year, 29 nautical miles (54km) southeast of the southern tip of Taiwan, although just outside restricted waters. The ship was observed lowering ropes into the water, suspected to be the deployment of scientific instruments for "illegal" survey operations, and the coast
Taiwan’s two cases of hantavirus so far this year are on par with previous years’ case numbers, and the government is coordinating rat extermination work, so there should not be any outbreaks, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Director-General Philip Lo (羅一鈞) said today in an interview with the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper). An increase in rat sightings in Taipei and New Taipei City has raised concerns about the spread of hantavirus, as rats can carry the disease. In January, a man in his 70s who lived in Taipei’s Daan District (大安) tested positive posthumously for hantavirus, Taiwan’s
RSS