Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) lawmakers yesterday questioned the accuracy of a report that had served as an important source for the government's decision to lift the ban on building eight-inch wafer foundries in China.
They claimed that a report released last December by the Industrial Development Bureau (IDB), under the Ministry of Economic Affairs, was full of misleading information, and what they said were untruthful statistics that even the conductors of the report were aware of.
The TSU legislators hold vice premier Lin Hsin-yi (林信義) responsible for the alleged inaccuracies and demanded that he give an explanation because he was the official who gave a green light to the proposal when he was minister of economic affairs last year.
The government will decide by the end of March whether to allow a request from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台基電) and United Microelectronics Corp (聯電) -- the world's largest and second largest contract chipmakers respectively -- to set up foundries in China.
TSU lawmaker Liao Pen-yen (
He said the report indicates that Taiwan has been able to mass-manufacture 12-inch wafers -- a technologically more advanced product than the eight-inch wafer, along with Japan and the US.
The report also said that it is necessary for Taiwan to enter the Chinese market because in contrast to China, Taiwan has less talent and limited resources.
"In reality, the production of 12-inch wafers is not widespread at all ? How can the government approve opening up if we have less talent than China," he said.
The TSU has argued that the government should wait until the production of 12-inch wafers ramps up before allowing eight-inch wafer fabs to be moved to China.
TSU legislator Huang Tsung-yuan (黃宗源) said that Shih Yen-hsiang (施顏祥), conductor of the report and head of the IDB, had told him in a legislative meeting yesterday that he was not in the know of some of the information used in the report.
"It is obvious that somebody purposely offered mistaken figures in a bid to mislead the government's policy," said Huang.
The National Immigration Agency (NIA) said yesterday that it will revoke the dependent-based residence permit of a Chinese social media influencer who reportedly “openly advocated for [China’s] unification through military force” with Taiwan. The Chinese national, identified by her surname Liu (劉), will have her residence permit revoked in accordance with Article 14 of the “Measures for the permission of family- based residence, long-term residence and settlement of people from the Mainland Area in the Taiwan Area,” the NIA said in a news release. The agency explained it received reports that Liu made “unifying Taiwan through military force” statements on her online
A magnitude 5.7 earthquake struck off Taitung County at 1:09pm today, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The hypocenter was 53km northeast of Taitung County Hall at a depth of 12.5km, CWA data showed. The intensity of the quake, which gauges the actual effect of a seismic event, measured 4 in Taitung County and Hualien County on Taiwan's seven-tier intensity scale, the data showed. The quake had an intensity of 3 in Nantou County, Chiayi County, Yunlin County, Kaohsiung and Tainan, the data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage following the quake.
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MINOR DISRUPTION: The outage affected check-in and security screening, while passport control was done manually and runway operations continued unaffected The main departure hall and other parts of Terminal 2 at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport lost power on Tuesday, causing confusion among passengers before electricity was fully restored more than an hour later. The outage, the cause of which is still being investigated, began at about midday and affected parts of Terminal 2, including the check-in gates, the security screening area and some duty-free shops. Parts of the terminal immediately activated backup power sources, while others remained dark until power was restored in some of the affected areas starting at 12:23pm. Power was fully restored at 1:13pm. Taoyuan International Airport Corp said in a
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