The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday accused the government of conducting “surveillance of the opposition” after the installation of CCTV cameras in front of its office in the Legislative Yuan in Taipei.
KMT Legislator Alex Fai (費鴻泰) told a conference outside the legislative chamber that the cameras — which have facial recognition and sound recording capabilities — were installed without the caucus’ assent.
The lack of such devices outside the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus office just down the corridor suggests the decision was politically motivated, Fai said, asking: “When did Taiwan become a police state?”
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
KMT caucus secretary-general Cheng Li-wen (鄭麗文) said that the cameras that were installed in 2014 were not so out-of-date that replacement was necessary.
Legislative Speaker You Si-kun (游錫堃) should explain the matter, she said.
KMT lawmakers also lodged a protest on the legislative floor.
You asked Legislative Yuan Secretary-General Lin Jih-jia (林志嘉) to halt installations until the matter is looked into and a report is delivered within 10 days.
Cameras were installed in 2012 following a request by the KMT caucus, which at the time was concerned about possible break-ins at office, Lin said.
As with the originals, the replacement cameras can only record video, and have no sound recording or facial recognition capabilities, he said.
The KMT caucus is free to sign a statement that it does not wish the installation to continue, he said.
Taiwan People’s Party Legislator Ann Kao (高虹安) said that no one would oppose the installations if they were for security purposes, but there should be more communication between the two sides prior to any such work.
There should also be strict regulations on how footage from the cameras is allowed to be used, Kao said.
Meanwhile, the DPP on Facebook yesterday said that the KMT caucus’ actions were out of line with the Occupational Hazard Insurance and Protection Act (勞工職業災害保險及保護法) and that its accusations about being surveilled were nonsense.
The KMT caucus said that the DPP, as the ruling party and having a legislative majority, should not shy from answering legitimate questions on possible abuse of surveillance footage.
It can do better than smearing the opposition and shifting the focus, the caucus said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching