Handover ceremonies were held at three government ministries yesterday as part of the Cabinet reshuffle announced on Friday.
At the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, David Lee (李大維) handed over the top post to Joseph Wu (吳釗燮), while Feng Shih-kuan (馮世寬) turned over the reins of the Ministry of National Defense to Yen Teh-fa (嚴德發) and Hsu Ming-chun (許銘春) took over as minister of labor from Lin Mei-chu (林美珠).
After being sworn in at the foreign ministry, Wu paid tribute to Lee, who has taken over the National Security Council (NSC), and pledged to continue to work closely with him.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
“Since the transition of power [in May 2016], Lee and I have been working together in the face of a new diplomatic situation and I am deeply aware of the difficulties of the job,” he said.
“I humble myself in front all of my predecessors,” said Wu, who previously served as Presidential Office secretary-general.
At the request of President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), he would strive to ensure that the ministry draws upon the expertise of other government agencies to better promote Taiwan’s diplomacy, Wu said.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Lee told the audience at the ceremony that Wu was the perfect choice to serve as foreign minister, since he has a deep understanding of the work.
There were no speeches at the defense ministry during the brief ceremony presided over by Minister Without Portfolio Lo Ping-cheng (羅秉成) that saw Feng handed over the seal of office to Yen, a retired three-star Army general who has served as chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces, vice minister of defense and, most recently, as NSC secretary-general.
However, Feng later posted some farewell comments on the military spokesman’s Facebook page.
Photo: Chang Chia-ming, Taipei Times
He had hoped to visit troops stationed on outlying islands and conscripts undergoing their four-month basic training, but those plans had to be canceled because of his new mission to take the helm of a government-funded think tank, the Institute for National Security Studies, Feng wrote.
The institute, which will focus on China’s military, is scheduled to open in May.
Minister without Portfolio Lin Wan-i (林萬億) presided over the handover at the Ministry of Labor.
Hsu, a former deputy mayor of Kaohsiung, said she would work to protect the rights of workers rather than acting as a rubber stamp for the government.
The latest amendments to the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法) mandate that the “one fixed day off and one flexible rest day” per week policy will take effect on Thursday, so she will not have a honeymoon period in her new post given that the ministry has to start labor inspections that same day, Hsu said.
Hsu said she will honor her promise to strive for workers’ rights by fulfilling her responsibilities as a supervisor.
The combined effect of the monsoon, the outer rim of Typhoon Fengshen and a low-pressure system is expected to bring significant rainfall this week to various parts of the nation, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The heaviest rain is expected to occur today and tomorrow, with torrential rain expected in Keelung’s north coast, Yilan and the mountainous regions of Taipei and New Taipei City, the CWA said. Rivers could rise rapidly, and residents should stay away from riverbanks and avoid going to the mountains or engaging in water activities, it said. Scattered showers are expected today in central and
COOPERATION: Taiwan is aligning closely with US strategic objectives on various matters, including China’s rare earths restrictions, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Taiwan could deal with China’s tightened export controls on rare earth metals by turning to “urban mining,” a researcher said yesterday. Rare earth metals, which are used in semiconductors and other electronic components, could be recovered from industrial or electronic waste to reduce reliance on imports, National Cheng Kung University Department of Resources Engineering professor Lee Cheng-han (李政翰) said. Despite their name, rare earth elements are not actually rare — their abundance in the Earth’s crust is relatively high, but they are dispersed, making extraction and refining energy-intensive and environmentally damaging, he said, adding that many countries have opted to
FORCED LABOR: A US court listed three Taiwanese and nine firms based in Taiwan in its indictment, with eight of the companies registered at the same address Nine companies registered in Taiwan, as well as three Taiwanese, on Tuesday were named by the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) as Specially Designated Nationals (SDNs) as a result of a US federal court indictment. The indictment unsealed at the federal court in Brooklyn, New York, said that Chen Zhi (陳志), a dual Cambodian-British national, is being indicted for fraud conspiracy, money laundering and overseeing Prince Holding Group’s forced-labor scam camps in Cambodia. At its peak, the company allegedly made US$30 million per day, court documents showed. The US government has seized Chen’s noncustodial wallet, which contains
SUPPLY CHAIN: Taiwan’s advantages in the drone industry include rapid production capacity that is independent of Chinese-made parts, the economic ministry said The Executive Yuan yesterday approved plans to invest NT$44.2 billion (US$1.44 billion) into domestic production of uncrewed aerial vehicles over the next six years, bringing Taiwan’s output value to more than NT$40 billion by 2030 and making the nation Asia’s democratic hub for the drone supply chain. The proposed budget has NT$33.8 billion in new allocations and NT$10.43 billion in existing funds, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said. Under the new development program, the public sector would purchase nearly 100,000 drones, of which 50,898 would be for civil and government use, while 48,750 would be for national defense, it said. The Ministry of
RSS