The anti-nuclear sit-in on Taipei’s Zhongxiao W Road was “a hijacking” led by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) said yesterday in response to questions by Taipei City councilors over the forced eviction of the protesters occupying the main thoroughfare in front of the Taipei Railway Station.
Hau, a member of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), was criticized by Taipei City councilors from the DPP for ordering police to disperse the protesters as he reported to the city council about the protest.
Police used water cannons dozens of times to dispel the peaceful protesters throughout the eviction on Sunday and yesterday.
Photo: Chen Chih-chu, Taipei Times
Saying that Hau’s report “blames everything on the public,” DPP Taipei City Councilor Juan Chao-hsiung (阮昭雄) said that people would not have to resort to street protests if the administration governed well.
DPP Taipei City Councilor Tung Chung-yen (童仲彥) played footage showing protesters being manhandled by police officers and said that police had also treated reporters violently and chased them from the scene.
Tung then tore up the city government’s report and threw the pieces toward Hau.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times
Before the session, Hau said that it is his duty as city mayor to protect residents from being affected by protests on a working day.
Describing the order to disperse the protesters as “a reluctant, but necessary” call, the mayor said he had urged the police to restore the flow of traffic along Zhongxiao E and Zhongxiao W roads.
Apparently irritated when a DPP councilor called him “the man pulling the strings behind the curtain,” Hau said that the DPP had been the one pulling the strings.
He accused DPP leaders, legislators and councilors of taking the protesters to the streets with them, “but then being incapable of dispelling them” and disappearing when the police arrived to evict the anti-nuclear activists.
Hau said the DPP led the road’s occupation in a bid to “blackmail Taipei residents” and said that the party had “treated Taipei residents as enemies.”
“It was no different that a hijacking,” he added.
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.
Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) is to begin his one-year alternative military service tomorrow amid ongoing legal issues, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. Wang, who last month was released on bail of NT$150,000 (US$4,561) as he faces charges of allegedly attempting to evade military service and forging documents, has been ordered to report to Taipei Railway Station at 9am tomorrow, the Alternative Military Service Training and Management Center said. The 33-year-old would join about 1,300 other conscripts in the 263rd cohort of general alternative service for training at the Chenggong Ling camp in Taichung, a center official told reporters. Wang would first
A BETRAYAL? It is none of the ministry’s business if those entertainers love China, but ‘you cannot agree to wipe out your own country,’ the MAC minister said Taiwanese entertainers in China would have their Taiwanese citizenship revoked if they are holding Chinese citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said. Several Taiwanese entertainers, including Patty Hou (侯佩岑) and Ouyang Nana (歐陽娜娜), earlier this month on their Weibo (微博) accounts shared a picture saying that Taiwan would be “returned” to China, with tags such as “Taiwan, Province of China” or “Adhere to the ‘one China’ principle.” The MAC would investigate whether those Taiwanese entertainers have Chinese IDs and added that it would revoke their Taiwanese citizenship if they did, Chiu told the Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper
RSS