Surrounded by dozens of friends, Tibetan activists and curious onlookers, the Dalai Lama’s nephew Jigme Norbu launched his 400km-plus walk from Taipei to Kaohsiung at Longshan Temple yesterday morning.
Having walked more than 11,000km, mostly in North America, to raise public awareness on Tibet and advocate independence for it, Norbu will take 13 days to walk from Taipei to Kaohsiung, meeting with supporters and Tibetans living in exile in Taiwan, as well as giving lectures on the Tibet issue at various universities and high schools across the nation.
“We chose today to begin the ‘Walk for Tibet’ in Taiwan, because today is a day with very important significance,” Norbu told the crowd at the square in front of the temple.
“Today is Human Rights Day; it’s also the anniversary of His Holiness the Dalai Lama winning the Nobel Peace Prize,” he said. “We’re also here to honor Nobel Prize-winner Liu Xiaobo [劉曉波], who is still in jail. We want to also celebrate the recent release of Burmese democracy fighter Aung San Suu Kyi.”
The Dalai Lama was awarded the peace prize in 1989, while Aung San Suu Kyi was released by the military junta in Myanmar last month.
Amid the crowd was former Democratic Progressive Party secretary-general Lee Ying-yuan (李應元), a long-time supporter of the Tibetan movement since he attended graduate school in the US in the 1980s and helped accommodate Norbu’s father, Thupten Jigme Norbu, when he visited Taiwan in 1998.
“During our long struggle for democracy, we received help from all over the world,” Lee told the crowd. “So when we enjoy our freedoms today, we should not forget less fortunate nations and peoples; we’re obliged to give them a hand.”
Turning to Norbu, Lee said Tibetans may have a long way to go in the pursuit of freedom and independence, but that they were not alone.
“Taiwan will always support you,” Lee said.
Norbu and his group reached Yingge Township (鶯歌), Taipei County, in the evening, where they met the local Tibetan community. They depart from Yingge Railway Station this morning and are to walk to Pusin Railway Station in Yangmei City (楊梅), Taoyuan County, where Norbu will give a lecture at National Tsing Hua University in Hsinchu City in the evening.
A strong continental cold air mass and abundant moisture bringing snow to mountains 3,000m and higher over the past few days are a reminder that more than 60 years ago Taiwan had an outdoor ski resort that gradually disappeared in part due to climate change. On Oct. 24, 2021, the National Development Council posted a series of photographs on Facebook recounting the days when Taiwan had a ski resort on Hehuanshan (合歡山) in Nantou County. More than 60 years ago, when developing a branch of the Central Cross-Island Highway, the government discovered that Hehuanshan, with an elevation of more than 3,100m,
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
Ferry operators are planning to provide a total of 1,429 journeys between Taiwan proper and its offshore islands to meet increased travel demand during the upcoming Lunar New Year holiday, the Maritime and Port Bureau said yesterday. The available number of ferry journeys on eight routes from Saturday next week to Feb. 2 is expected to meet a maximum transport capacity of 289,414 passengers, the bureau said in a news release. Meanwhile, a total of 396 journeys on the "small three links," which are direct ferries connecting Taiwan's Kinmen and Lienchiang counties with China's Fujian Province, are also being planned to accommodate
RSS