Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Scheming behind closed doors

Taipei Times Editorial

When the legislature decided in 2004 to cut the number of legislative seats from 225 to 113, it wasted a great deal of taxpayers’ money. It could have just kept the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), Democratic Progressive Party, Taiwan Solidarity Union and People First Party caucus whips, the legislative speaker and the deputy legislative speaker. That is because these six people are all you need they are the ones who participate in caucus negotiations, and they are the ones who decide what counts. All the other legislators are only there to give moral support and to pass the laws this select group has agreed should be passed.

Chen Shui-bian stable after suicide bid

Taipei Times

Former president Chen Shui-bian waves as he arrives at the Taiwan High Court in Taipei on Aug. 26, 2011.
Photo: AFP

Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) attempted to commit suicide by hanging himself with a towel at a prison hospital in Greater Taichung on Sunday night, but was stopped by a caretaker, the Ministry of Justice said yesterday.

Deputy Minister of Justice Chen Ming-tang (陳明堂) said that Chen, who is serving a 20-year jail sentence for corruption, was distraught that public funds could now be spent legally in hostess bars, while the courts had found his use of them for diplomatic projects to have been a criminal offense.

Ma in ‘international legal suicide’

Taipei Times

President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) recent elaborations on the issue of Taiwan’s statehood, given the complex nature of the legal status of the Republic of China (ROC), was likely “international legal suicide” and a deception of the people of Taiwan, academics said in a forum last week.

Ma appears to have been self-conflicting and inconsistent in his interpretation of the cross-strait framework, Brad Roth, a professor of political science and law at Wayne State University in Michigan, told a forum organized by Taiwan Thinktank.

Unresolved sovereignty of Taiwan spawns new challenge to Republic of China (Photos)

Michael Richardson

Nieco Tsai and the Dalai Lama pray for Taiwan

The sixty-seven year control of Taiwan by the exiled Republic of China government has a new challenger on the scene boldly named Taiwan Government. The new group is being organized by two men, an American living in Taiwan and a Taiwanese living in America. Nieco Tsai said on May 30 that a formal announcement and ceremony will soon be scheduled to launch a future provisional government. Meanwhile Richard Hartzell is completing a week-long tour of the island today gathering support for the new organization.

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