Independence advocates yesterday announced the launch of a signature drive demanding that Academia Sinica change its name.
The initiative is supported by senior presidential adviser Yao Chia-wen (姚嘉文), Taiwan Nation Alliance Convener Wu Shu-min (吳樹民) and more than 30 groups. They expect that it would gather the targeted number of signatures next week.
Yao, Wu and others on June 20 paid Academia Sinica president James Liao (廖俊智) a visit, urging him to support their cause, they said.
Photo: Tien Yu-hua, Taipei Times
The name Academia Sinica, meaning “Chinese Academy” in Latin, might cause people in the international scientific community to mistakenly believe the institution is based in China, Yao said.
They might think that research conducted by Taiwanese academics was done by Chinese, Yao said.
Liao said that few people are aware that “Sinica” means “Chinese,” including his daughter, a student at Yale University.
However, he said he would forward the request to an institutional affairs meeting at Academia Sinica.
Yao said Liao’s reaction was “lukewarm” and he seemed to consider the request “troublesome.”
“Sinica” should be replaced by “Taiwan” or “Formosa,” he added.
Yao said he and other supporters of a name change would visit the Legislative Yuan, which is due to review Academia Sinica’s research budget in the next session.
He hopes that the institution would agree to change its name during that session.
Academia Sinica said that it established a task force in October last year after legislators had inquired about a name change and proposed four possible options.
The first was to keep the name; the second was to add “Taiwan” to the name; the third was to change the name to “Central Research Academy,” a direct translation of the institute’s name in Chinese; and the fourth was to change the name to “Taiwan Academy of Sciences” or “Academy of Sciences Taiwan.”
Rainfall is expected to become more widespread and persistent across central and southern Taiwan over the next few days, with the effects of the weather patterns becoming most prominent between last night and tomorrow, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Independent meteorologist Daniel Wu (吳德榮) said that based on the latest forecast models of the combination of a low-pressure system and southwesterly winds, rainfall and flooding are expected to continue in central and southern Taiwan from today to Sunday. The CWA also warned of flash floods, thunder and lightning, and strong gusts in these areas, as well as landslides and fallen
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
SOUTH CHINA SEA? The Philippine president spoke of adding more classrooms and power plants, while skipping tensions with China over disputed areas Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday blasted “useless and crumbling” flood control projects in a state of the nation address that focused on domestic issues after a months-long feud with his vice president. Addressing a joint session of congress after days of rain that left at least 31 dead, Marcos repeated his recent warning that the nation faced a climate change-driven “new normal,” while pledging to investigate publicly funded projects that had failed. “Let’s not pretend, the people know that these projects can breed corruption. Kickbacks ... for the boys,” he said, citing houses that were “swept away” by the floods. “Someone has
‘CRUDE’: The potential countermeasure is in response to South Africa renaming Taiwan’s representative offices and the insistence that it move out of Pretoria Taiwan is considering banning exports of semiconductors to South Africa after the latter unilaterally downgraded and changed the names of Taiwan’s two representative offices, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. On Monday last week, the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation unilaterally released a statement saying that, as of April 1, the Taipei Liaison Offices in Pretoria and Cape Town had been renamed the “Taipei Commercial Office in Johannesburg” and the “Taipei Commercial Office in Cape Town.” Citing UN General Assembly Resolution 2758, it said that South Africa “recognizes the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole
RSS