Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lin Ching-yi (林靜儀) yesterday criticized the Joint Commission of Taiwan for attending a conference in China and allowing the organizer to change the group’s nationality to the “Taiwan area.”
The organization, formerly the Taiwan Joint Commission on Hospital Accreditation, is to attend next month’s First National Hospital Accreditation Forum and the Fourth International Forum on Hospital Evaluation and Quality Promotion held by China’s National Institute of Hospital Administration in Hubei Province’s Wuhan, Lin said.
The forum’s official release listed the commission as a co-organizer from the domestic “Taiwan area” she said, adding that the organization knows Taiwan’s sovereignty is being dwarfed, but it still “sticks its hot face to China’s cold butt.”
Photo: Chu Pei-hsiung, Taipei Times
The commission said it has been invited to attend the annual forum since 2015, but it was listed as a “supporter” in 2016 and last year, Lin said, adding that the forum’s documents used the phrases “some of our nation’s provinces and the Taiwan area” and “our nation’s Taiwan area.”
About 85 percent of the organization’s funding is from bidding on government projects and 14 percent is from government subsidies, so the majority of the organization’s budget is public money, DPP Legislator Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) said.
Even though the group encourages nonpolitical communication and professional exchanges with China, it is still considered a semi-governmental organization, so it should not use government subsidies to attend a forum that belittles the nation’s sovereignty, she said.
The commission also received a subsidy of about NT$100,000 from a Ministry of Health and Welfare project for promoting linkages with and developing the healthcare industry in nations targeted by the New Southbound Policy, but attending a forum in China should not be considered “southbound,” Lin said.
DPP Legislator Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) said he cannot accept that the organization has attended the forum three years in a row and is still so politically insensitive.
The commission should not become a tool of China’s “united front” tactics, Lee said, adding that he plans to propose revoking the organization’s funds to attend the forum.
“You have been taken advantage of for three consecutive years — why do you want to go a fourth time?” Lin asked.
The commission has been careful about terminology and has tried to maintain the nation’s dignity, but the press releases issued by the organizer after the forum did not need the organization’s approval, commission deputy chief executive Huang Chung-yi (黃仲毅) said.
The organization would conform to the government’s policy and try to connect with more southbound nations, Huang added.
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