The heads of Taiwan's five government branches yesterday reached a consensus in three areas, including the establishment of a communications platform to resolve disagreements, after attending a meeting led by President William Lai (賴清德).
Speaking after the meeting, Presidential Office Secretary-General Pan Men-an (潘孟安) said the five branch heads agreed to set up a platform to improve communications and cooperation to enable them to advance public policies and reinforce Taiwan's democracy and freedom.
Photo: CNA
They also agreed that the five branches of government — the Executive Yuan, Legislative Yuan, Judicial Yuan, Examination Yuan and Control Yuan — all have their own duties and checks and balances, but still need to respect each other.
The five branch heads also believed that competition among political parties is allowed, but that the nation cannot be sacrificed by their competition, as Taiwan is faced with a fast-changing world.
They felt that the five branches needed to unite, in particular on national defense and diplomatic issues by prioritizing national security, Pan said.
The meeting was called by Lai to discuss issues related to Taiwan and the severe political and economic challenges it faces at home and abroad.
More specifically, it was focused on the stand-off between Lai's Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) government and the Legislative Yuan, in which the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People's Party (TPP) have teamed up to pass measures strongly opposed by the DPP.
Most recently, the two sides have battled over the central government's budget.
The KMT and TPP have cut or froze some of the DPP's budget request, but still allowed the overall budget to grow by about 3 percent compared with last year.
However, the DPP has argued that the cuts would make it hard for it to carry out its policies.
After the meeting, Pan said national security, economic development and caring for the people cannot be compromised and represent the responsibilities and goals that the ruling and opposition parties should pursue together.
Both the ruling and opposition parties should put people in the country first, and therefore the five branches should work together to boost the local economy and strengthen industrial development to protect public welfare, he said.
How those principles would lead to conciliation between the different sides was unclear, given that Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) is the only head of the five branches aligned with the opposition, and his post does not involve policymaking.
The confrontation in the Legislative Yuan has led to a massive campaign initiated by DPP caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) to recall KMT lawmakers, and the KMT decided to retaliate.
After the meeting, Han hoped Lai would urge the ruling and opposition camps to stop their recall campaigns.
He also called on the Cabinet not to ask the Legislative Yuan to vote a second time on the general budget plan once it is submitted to the government, but said the legislature was willing to hold cross-party negotiations to find a solution to parts of the budget the Executive Yuan has claimed it would have trouble implementing.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
RSS