Mainland Affairs Council Vice Chairman Johnnason Liu (
Liu's words came amid reports that former Singaporean prime minister Lee Kuan Yew (
Cross-strait dialogue has been stalled since 1999, when then president Lee Teng-hui (
Meanwhile, the pan-blue camp's insistence on depriving the government of the authority to issue permits for direct links was not an idea backed by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) said yesterday.
"Ma told me that the government's authority to deal with the issue of cross-strait direct links should be respected by the legislature," Wang said. "Ma also said that the legislative power should not override the [government's] administrative power."
Wang met with Ma yesterday to discuss legislative issues, including the amendment to revise the 28th clause of the Statute Governing the Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (
The pan-green camp has twice blocked the amendments from review on the legislative floor, because they oppose undermining the government's authority.
Organizing one national referendum and 26 recall elections targeting Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators could cost NT$1.62 billion (US$55.38 million), the Central Election Commission said yesterday. The cost of each recall vote ranges from NT$16 million to NT$20 million, while that of a national referendum is NT$1.1 billion, the commission said. Based on the higher estimate of NT$20 million per recall vote, if all 26 confirmed recall votes against KMT legislators are taken into consideration, along with the national referendum on restarting the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant, the total could be as much as NT$1.62 billion, it said. The commission previously announced
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday welcomed NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte’s remarks that the organization’s cooperation with Indo-Pacific partners must be deepened to deter potential threats from China and Russia. Rutte on Wednesday in Berlin met German Chancellor Friedrich Merz ahead of a ceremony marking the 70th anniversary of Germany’s accession to NATO. He told a post-meeting news conference that China is rapidly building up its armed forces, and the number of vessels in its navy outnumbers those of the US Navy. “They will have another 100 ships sailing by 2030. They now have 1,000 nuclear warheads,” Rutte said, adding that such
Tropical Storm Nari is not a threat to Taiwan, based on its positioning and trajectory, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Nari has strengthened from a tropical depression that was positioned south of Japan, it said. The eye of the storm is about 2,100km east of Taipei, with a north-northeast trajectory moving toward the eastern seaboard of Japan, CWA data showed. Based on its current path, the storm would not affect Taiwan, the agency said.
The cosponsors of a new US sanctions package targeting Russia on Thursday briefed European allies and Ukraine on the legislation and said the legislation would also have a deterrent effect on China and curb its ambitions regarding Taiwan. The bill backed by US senators Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal calls for a 500 percent tariff on goods imported from countries that buy Russian oil, gas, uranium and other exports — targeting nations such as China and India, which account for about 70 percent of Russia’s energy trade, the bankroll of much of its war effort. Graham and Blumenthal told The Associated Press
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