China’s failure to respond on the matter of a Taiwanese man missing in China is causing his family “anxiety and panic,” the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, as it called on authorities to protect the rights of Taiwanese.
Concern has risen in Taiwan about the whereabouts of Lee Ming-che (李明哲), a community college worker known for supporting human rights in China who disappeared on Sunday last week after entering China’s Zhuhai city via Macau.
Chinese authorities had repeatedly said they would protect the rights of Taiwanese in China in accordance with the law, the DPP said.
Photo: Su Fang-ho, Taipei Times
“But after six days, there has been no official response by China to requests for consultations about the search by our government and his family,” DPP spokesman Chang Chih-hao (張志豪) said in the party’s strongest statement yet on Lee’s disappearance.
“This has caused the family anxiety and panic,” Chang said.
The party called on Chinese authorities to respond promptly to requests for cooperation and “effectively protect human rights and not increase the risk of Taiwanese traveling to China,” Chang said.
The Straits Exchange Foundation and the Mainland Affairs Council have said they have been unable to raise a response from their Chinese counterparts over Lee’s case.
Lee’s case raised questions about the safety of people working with civic society in China, Amnesty International’s East Asia director Nicholas Bequelin said.
Lee had been supporting organizations and rights advocates in China for years, but went to China this time for personal matters related to his mother-in-law’s medical condition, Amnesty International said.
“If Lee Ming-che has been detained, then please tell me the charges,” Lee’s wife, Lee Ching-yu (李淨瑜), said at a news conference on Friday organized by the Taiwan Association for Human Rights.
“Please tell her if her husband is alive or dead, where is he,” the rights group said in a statement.
TIMING: 'The CHIPS Act funding is crucial for us. In other words, if the act’s passage is delayed for too long, we will certainly need to adjust,’ chairwoman Doris Hsu said GlobalWafers Co (環球晶圓) plans to start construction on a US$5 billion wafer fabrication facility in Texas in November, after passage of the US$52 billion Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) for America Act. The fab would be the largest of its kind in the US and one of the largest in the world, with a monthly capacity of 1.2 million wafers, GlobalWafers said, adding that the investment would be the first new fab in the US in more than 20 years and critical to closing a semiconductor supply chain gap. The world’s No. 3 silicon wafer supplier said the project, which
Samsung Electronics Co yesterday commenced mass production of 3-nanometer chips that are more powerful and efficient than predecessors, beating rival Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to a key milestone in the race to build the most advanced chips in the world. South Korea’s largest company said in a statement that it was beginning with 3-nanometer semiconductors for high-performance and specialized low-power computing applications before expanding to mobile processors. By applying so-called Gate-All-Around transistor architecture, Samsung’s 3-nanometer products reduce power consumption by up to 45 percent and improve performance by 23 percent compared with 5-nanometer chips, it said. Samsung’s push to be first
COUNTERING CHINA: ‘When democracies demonstrate what we can do ... I have no doubt that we’ll win that competition every time,’ US President Joe Biden said US President Joe Biden rebooted his effort to counter China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) after an earlier campaign faltered, enlisting the support of G7 leaders at their summit in Germany. The Build Back Better World initiative, named after Biden’s domestic spending and climate agenda, struggled to get off the ground because not enough G7 partners contributed financially when it was unveiled a year ago, people familiar with its lack of progress said. “When democracies demonstrate what we can do — all that we have to offer — I have no doubt that we’ll win that competition every time,” Biden said during
Three to four tropical storms or typhoons are expected to hit Taiwan this year due to a weak La Nina effect in the northwest Pacific Ocean, the Central Weather Bureau (CWB) said yesterday, as typhoon season begins next month. Taiwan’s typhoon season generally lasts from July to September, with most typhoons occurring in August. Weather Forecast Center Director Lu Kuo-chen (呂國臣) told a news conference that a weakening La Nina is expected to have less of an effect on Taiwan. “The climate simulation we conducted, and those conducted by other meteorological agencies around the world, showed that the number of typhoons that
RSS