Pro-independence political parties yesterday lamented Tsai’s adhering to the “status quo” and the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (台灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) in her second inaugural address.
The Taiwan Statebuilding Party had on Tuesday called on Tsai to avoid emphasizing the act, which refers to an inevitable unification of Taiwan and China.
The Taiwan Statebuilding Party yesterday said it was regrettable that Tsai had maintained her stance on adhering to the act, and said it would press forward with promoting its proposed bill on China relations, which would break the impasse caused by references to inevitable unification.
Photo: Screen grab from Hsu Yung-ming’s Facebook page
“Under the limitations of the current laws and Constitution, how can the administration lead Taiwan in presenting itself as a country? How can it act pre-emptively and reinvent itself?” the party said.
While the party understands the weight of the governing party’s responsibilities, and the limitations it faces, Taiwan should not limit itself at “this important moment for transformation,” it said.
The government should speed up the process of desinicization of Taiwan, it said, adding that the government should “imitate the governments of the US and Japan, and help industry pull out of China.”
Reducing Taiwan’s economic reliance on China is also important to protecting trade secrets and sensitive technologies, it said, adding that the government must better scrutinize those in politics who have significant investments in China.
The government should establish an agency similar to Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, which would allow independent review of political parties suspected of undermining the nation’s democracy, which should be disbanded, it said.
New Power Party (NPP) Chairman Hsu Yung-ming (徐永明) said he was happy to see Tsai bring up the issue of constitutional amendment during her address.
However, he said he was concerned that in reiterating her administration’s adherence to the “status quo” in cross-strait relations, Taiwan might miss the opportunity to develop its international space amid a shifting international perception during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Hsu and NPP caucus whip Chiu Hsien-chih (邱顯智) wore pink to Tsai’s inauguration ceremony to call attention to what they said is a worsening gender imbalance in the Executive Yuan, with the new Cabinet having fewer female members.
The two NPP members also urged Tsai to move forward with a proposal to lower the voting age to 18, which they said already has wide public support.
Hsu said he had spoken to Democratic Progressive Party caucus convener Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) at the ceremony, and the two agreed that a constitutional amendment committee should be established.
However, opposition parties would need to be consulted before such a committee could be established, he added.
Taiwanese can file complaints with the Tourism Administration to report travel agencies if their activities caused termination of a person’s citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said yesterday, after a podcaster highlighted a case in which a person’s citizenship was canceled for receiving a single-use Chinese passport to enter Russia. The council is aware of incidents in which people who signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of Russia were told they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, Chiu told reporters on the sidelines of an event in Taipei. However, the travel agencies actually applied
Japanese footwear brand Onitsuka Tiger today issued a public apology and said it has suspended an employee amid allegations that the staff member discriminated against a Vietnamese customer at its Taipei 101 store. Posting on the social media platform Threads yesterday, a user said that an employee at the store said that “those shoes are very expensive” when her friend, who is a migrant worker from Vietnam, asked for assistance. The employee then ignored her until she asked again, to which she replied: "We don't have a size 37." The post had amassed nearly 26,000 likes and 916 comments as of this
New measures aimed at making Taiwan more attractive to foreign professionals came into effect this month, the National Development Council said yesterday. Among the changes, international students at Taiwanese universities would be able to work in Taiwan without a work permit in the two years after they graduate, explainer materials provided by the council said. In addition, foreign nationals who graduated from one of the world’s top 200 universities within the past five years can also apply for a two-year open work permit. Previously, those graduates would have needed to apply for a work permit using point-based criteria or have a Taiwanese company
The Shilin District Prosecutors’ Office yesterday indicted two Taiwanese and issued a wanted notice for Pete Liu (劉作虎), founder of Shenzhen-based smartphone manufacturer OnePlus Technology Co (萬普拉斯科技), for allegedly contravening the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) by poaching 70 engineers in Taiwan. Liu allegedly traveled to Taiwan at the end of 2014 and met with a Taiwanese man surnamed Lin (林) to discuss establishing a mobile software research and development (R&D) team in Taiwan, prosecutors said. Without approval from the government, Lin, following Liu’s instructions, recruited more than 70 software
RSS