A political struggle loomed between President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and PFP Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) yesterday over whether the president should ask the Legislative Yuan to sit for a special session to confirm the president's 15 nominees for the Council of Grand Justices.
James Huang (黃志芳), director of the Department of Public Affairs under the Presidential Office, defended Chen's power to ask the legislature for a special session, saying that the president is empowered by the Constitution to do so when he considers it appropriate.
Huang made the statement to dispute a claim by Soong that the president would be defying the law by asking for the special session.
He also rebutted a claim by Soong that the president informed the Legislative Yuan of his nominations too late and without any information about the nominees' backgrounds and resumes. Huang said the president asked the Legislative Yuan to confirm the nominees in a letter dated May 21 and delivered the background information in 16 cases on May 23, well ahead of the deadline set by the Legislative Yuan itself.
Huang said this fact should not be distorted, even though the Legislative Yuan chose not to do the confirmation in the session that was originally set to end May 31 but was extended.
Soong, whose PFP won the support of 107 lawmakers on May 30 to review Chen's nominees from Sept. 5 to 16 in the next session, claimed that reviewing the nominations in the current session would be too hasty.
Angered by the Legislative Yuan's spurning his request, Chen and the DPP were considering whether to ask the legislature for a special session before the end of June to exercise its right to confirm the nominations.
Chen and his party said the terms of the incumbent Grand Justices will have expired by Sept. 30. If the president's nominees are not all confirmed -- which is not unlikely in the current political situation -- the president might not have time to nominate replacements and the Council of Grand Justices might have to stop functioning due to a lack of members.
However, Legislative Yuan President Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) cautioned that the legislature will have to turn down the president's request for a special session, since it has already resolved to act on the nominations in September and Chen's request for a special session does not constitute any of the cases provided for in the Constitution.
INCREASED CAPACITY: The flights on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays would leave Singapore in the morning and Taipei in the afternoon Singapore Airlines is adding four supplementary flights to Taipei per week until May to meet increased tourist and business travel demand, the carrier said on Friday. The addition would raise the number of weekly flights it operates to Taipei to 18, Singapore Airlines Taiwan general manager Timothy Ouyang (歐陽漢源) said. The airline has recorded a steady rise in tourist and business travel to and from Taipei, and aims to provide more flexible travel arrangements for passengers, said Ouyang, who assumed the post in July last year. From now until Saturday next week, four additional flights would depart from Singapore on Monday, Wednesday, Friday
Taiwan’s three major international carriers are increasing booking fees, with EVA Airways having already increased the charge to US$28 per flight segment from US$25, while China Airlines (CAL) and Starlux Airlines are set to follow suit. Booking fees are charged by airlines through a global distribution system (GDS) and passed on to passengers. Carriers that apply the fees include CAL, EVA, Starlux and Tigerair Taiwan. A GDS is a computerized network operated by a company that connects airlines with travel agents and ticketing platforms, allowing reservations to be made and processed in real time. Major players include Amadeus, Sabre and Travelport. EVA Air began
The Ministry of National Defense yesterday reported the return of large-scale Chinese air force activities after their unexplained absence for more than two weeks, which had prompted speculation regarding Beijing’s motives. China usually sends fighter jets, drones and other military aircraft around the nation on a daily basis. Interruptions to such routine are generally caused by bad weather. The Ministry of National Defense said it had detected 26 Chinese military aircraft in the Taiwan Strait over the previous 24 hours. It last reported that many aircraft on Feb. 25, when it spotted 30 aircraft, saying Beijing was carrying out another “joint combat
WATCH FOR HITCHHIKERS: The CDC warned those returning home from Japan to be alert for any contagious diseases that might have come back with them People who have returned from Japan following the World Baseball Classic (WBC) games during the weekend are recommended to watch for symptoms of infectious gastroenteritis, flu and measles for two weeks, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said. Flu viruses remain the most common respiratory pathogen in Taiwan in the past four weeks and the influenza B virus accounted for 55.7 percent of the tested cases, exceeding the percentage of influenza A (H3N2) infections and becoming the local dominant strain, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said at a news conference on Tuesday. There were 82,187 hospital visits for
RSS