Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Mayor’s competence questioned

Taipei Times Editorial

“When written in Chinese, the word ‘crisis’ [危機] is composed of two characters — one represents danger and the other represents opportunity,” former US president John F. Kennedy said.

The quote surely comes as an apt description of the situation currently facing embattled Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強), who’s been engulfed in a controversy over seemingly dubious ties between the police and the underworld and questionable police integrity following a shooting on May 28, in which four Taichung police officers were found at the scene yet failed to intervene.

Chen acquitted on graft charge

Taipei Times

The Taipei District Court yesterday acquitted former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) in an embezzlement case involving US$330,000 in secret diplomatic funds.

The court ruling said that evidence provided by prosecutors failed to prove that Chen had embezzled diplomatic funds, court spokesman Huang Chun-ming (黃俊明) said.

Forum told Taiwanese Castro will emerge

Taipei Times

A political strongman in the mold of former Cuban president Fidel Castro is likely to emerge in Taiwan to resist China’s economic interference should the proposed economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with Beijing ravage the middle-classes and benefit only large corporations, an expert attending a forum on the ECFA said yesterday.

Hsu Chung-hsin, a law professor at National Cheng Kung University, said once China took over Taiwan’s economy, even if Taiwan was still politically independent, a candidate with a radical platform was likely to be elected because the public would likely no longer be able to stand the yawning chasm between rich and poor and the stagnation of salaries.

Human rights must be considered

Lin Feng-jeng 林峰正

It has been 21 years since the Tiananmen Square Massacre. As everyone in Taiwan reflects on the pros and cons of establishing closer trade relations with China and trying to reach some kind of consensus on what Taiwan can expect from an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA), perhaps a quick review of the state of human rights in China will help us focus on the type of relationship we want.

Media reports show there were four separate incidents of mentally ill people stabbing children and teachers to death in kindergartens and elementary schools in Fujian, Guangdong, Jiangsu and Shaanxi provinces between March 28 and May 12. One of the attackers committed suicide, while two were sentenced to death and executed.

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