Lawmakers on Friday invited Czech Chamber of Deputies Speaker Marketa Pekarova Adamova to deliver a speech in the legislature when she visits Taiwan next month.
Caucus whips across party lines agreed to invite Adamova to address the legislature on March 28, Legislative Speaker You Si-kun (游錫?) said.
You said he had put forward the idea during a cross-party negotiation meeting, and caucus whips across party lines agreed to extend the invitation to Adamova, as was done in 2020, when Czech Senate President Milos Vystrcil visited Taiwan.
Photo: AFP
Adamova is scheduled to visit Taiwan in March, as part of an Asian tour that would also include South Korea, she wrote on Twitter last week.
According to an online announcement by the Czech-Taiwanese Business Chamber (CTBC) earlier this month, Adamova would arrive in Taiwan on March 25, via a charter flight arranged by the Czech government.
She would attend official engagements in Taipei with business representatives from the Czech Republic from March 27 to 29, the CTBC said.
Lawmakers also agreed that the new legislative session would open on Friday with a plenary meeting, at which Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) and his Cabinet would present their policies and answer questions by legislators.
Meanwhile, the caucus whips of all parties have agreed that a vote on two bills that seek to distribute surplus tax revenues in the form of cash payments would take place on Feb. 21.
One of the bills was put forward by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) last month, proposing that citizens and eligible foreign nationals would be given a one-off cash handout of NT$6,000 taken from last year’s tax surplus.
In the second draft bill, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has proposed a handout of NT$10,000, saying that it should also take into account the tax surplus from previous years.
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake struck off the coast of Hualien County in eastern Taiwan at 7pm yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The epicenter of the temblor was at sea, about 69.9km south of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 30.9km, it said. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The earthquake’s intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was highest in Taitung County’s Changbin Township (長濱), where it measured 5 on Taiwan’s seven-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 4 in Hualien, Nantou, Chiayi, Yunlin, Changhua and Miaoli counties, as well as
Credit departments of farmers’ and fishers’ associations blocked a total of more than NT$180 million (US$6.01 million) from being lost to scams last year, National Police Agency (NPA) data showed. The Agricultural Finance Agency (AFA) said last week that staff of farmers’ and fishers’ associations’ credit departments are required to implement fraud prevention measures when they serve clients at the counter. They would ask clients about personal financial management activities whenever they suspect there might be a fraud situation, and would immediately report the incident to local authorities, which would send police officers to the site to help, it said. NPA data showed
ENERGY RESILIENCE: Although Alaska is open for investments, Taiwan is sourcing its gas from the Middle East, and the sea routes carry risks, Ho Cheng-hui said US government officials’ high-profile reception of a Taiwanese representative at the Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference indicated the emergence of an Indo-Pacific energy resilience alliance, an academic said. Presidential Office Secretary-General Pan Men-an (潘孟安) attended the conference in Alaska on Thursday last week at the invitation of the US government. Pan visited oil and gas facilities with senior US officials, including US Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum, US Secretary of Energy Chris Wright, Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy and US Senator Daniel Sullivan. Pan attending the conference on behalf of President William Lai (賴清德) shows a significant elevation in diplomatic representation,
The Taipei MRT is to begin accepting mobile payment services in the fall, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp said on Saturday. When the company finishes the installation of new payment units at ticketing gates in October, MRT passengers can use credit cards, Apple Pay, Google Pay and Samsung Pay, the operator said. In addition, the MRT would also provide QR payment codes — which would be compatible with Line Pay, Jkopay, iPass Money, PXPay Plus, EasyWallet, iCash Pay, Taiwan Pay and Taishin Pay — to access the railway system. Currently, passengers can access the Taipei MRT by buying a single-journey token or using EasyCard,