Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Containing China in new cold war

Paul Lin 林保華

On Monday, the US and South Korea held their second joint military exercise in a month. The scale of the drill outstripped that of the first drill, held late last month, by three times. Despite both Chinese and North Korean threats, the US and South Korean insistence on the drills was a response to North Korea’s alleged sinking of the South Korean Cheonan warship. It was also a reaction to China’s recent claim that the Yellow Sea and the South China Sea are part of its core interests.

Dapu farmland owner’s funeral draws over 1,000

Taipei Times

Over 1,000 people from more than 10 farming and human rights advocacy groups across the country attended the funeral of 72-year-old Chu Feng Min (朱馮敏), who allegedly committed suicide earlier this month to protest land seizures by the government.

Chu Feng, a native of Dapu Bourough (大埔), Jhunan Township (竹南), Miaoli County, was found dead on a chair on the porch of her house after swallowing a bottle of insecticide without leaving a suicide note behind on the morning of Aug. 3.

To Be Whole, Taiwan Must Shed Itself of its KMT Carpetbagger Legacy: Part I

Jerome F. Keating Ph.D.

Taiwan has many problems, not only with its economy but even with its democracy and identity. In the past two years Taiwan's economy has gone nowhere but down under President Ma Ying-jeou; his 6-3-3 promise is at best a country wide joke. The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) from its one-party state days up to the present still controls the Legislative Yuan. For this reason it maintains tremendous leverage, and its possession of the stolen state assets can go unchallenged. Thus, the KMT can continue to place party interests before Taiwan's national interests. Or put another way, the KMT only protects Taiwan's interests if they protect the KMT interests. This is the root of Taiwan's problems and what Taiwanese still have not yet grasped. The KMT is a carpetbagger party that exists to serve its carpetbagger interests and preserve the Constitutional fantasy that perpetuates its carpetbagger rights.

Taiwan-China ECFA now faces performance test

Taiwan News Editorial

The rubber-stamp passage by the Legislative Yuan of the "Cross-Strait Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement" with the authoritarian People's Republic of China will not end the controversy over the pact.

President Ma Ying-jeou and senior officials of his rightist Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang) government have succeeded in making the disputed pact an accomplished fact despite sharp criticism and street and legislative protests by the opposition Democratic Progressive Party and a wide range of labor, environmental, consumer and civic groups over its potential negative impacts on agriculture, traditional or domestic-market oriented industries, domestic employment and wages, democratic transparency and accountability and Taiwan's economic and political autonomy.

Mailiao residents continue protests

Taipei Times

Residents of Mailiao Township (麥寮) in Yunlin County yesterday staged another protest by blocking three major roads leading to a petrochemical complex owned by the Formosa Plastics Group, but dispersed after drawing complaints from motorists about traffic disruption.

Dissatisfied with the county government’s role in compensation talks, the protesters shouted: “Yunlin County Commissioner Su Chih-feng [蘇治芬], step down,” and complained of “under-the-table operations.”

Door opened to Chinese students

Taipei Times

Taiwan’s colleges and graduate schools will begin accepting Chinese students next spring after the legislature yesterday approved amendments recognizing Chinese certificates and allowing Chinese students to study in Taiwan.

Following rounds of negotiation, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucuses reached consensus by agreeing to write into law that Taiwan will not recognize Chinese certificates in medicine-related areas and that Chinese students will be prohibited from enrolling in departments that deal with national security matters such as national defense, sensitive agricultural technology, aviation, satellite technology and hydrological subjects.

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