Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Groups warn on cracks in nuclear reactor

Taipei Times

Retired Taiwan Power Co technician Lee Kuei-lin, left, accompanied by Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Tien Chiu-chin, yesterday explains the seriousness of recent accidents at the Guosheng Nuclear Power Plant at the legislature.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times

Cracks of up to 30cm have been found on the core shroud of the No.1 reactor at the idled Guosheng Nuclear Power Plant in Wanli District (萬里), New Taipei City (新北市), an Atomic Energy Council official has confirmed.

Civic groups yesterday warned against reactivating the plant.

In addition to unsettled concerns about cracked anchor bolts at the reactor, Green Consumers Foundation chairman Jay Fang (方儉) revealed that two cracks were found on welded parts of the core shroud, which Fang said could lead to disaster if the reactor is reactivated without repairs.

Textbook tactics to re-write history

Liberty Times Editorial

Nowhere, other than Taiwan, would another nation be able to interfere with — or be allowed to interfere with — the contents of school materials that address the debate over national identity and history. Despite that, on June 13, the debate and controversy over Taiwanese history as portrayed in Taiwan’s senior-high school history books was discussed at a news conference held by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) with the office spokesperson making the absurd demand that President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration put its house in order, without taking the care as to whether or not it gave people the impression that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) are cooperating with each other.

Repression vs resistance in Tibet

Andre Glucksmann,Karel Schwarzenberg, Desmond Tutu,Richard v

The grim spectacle of young monks, nuns and lay people setting themselves on fire to protest conditions in their homeland is a stark reminder of the gloom and despair that now prevails on the Tibetan Plateau. These acts of self-immolation — at least 36 since March last year — have been staged to protest the increasingly heavy controls that China’s government in Beijing has imposed on Buddhist religious practices. At the end of last month, a self-immolation occurred for the first time in Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, which may be a powerful portent of new turmoil in Tibet.

PRC’s religious freedom not for all

Taipei Times Editorial

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) likes to promote that its constitution enshrines freedom of religion, as well as the freedom not to believe in a religion, and bans discrimination on the grounds of religion or lack thereof. The important — but unstated — caveat is that religion must be state-sanctioned.

The PRC also likes to send delegations to international events, including religious gatherings. However, it is often reluctant to play by the rules of such gatherings (as Taiwanese know all too well), a tendency it demonstrated once again this week when 17 Chinese delegates left the South Korean city of Yeosu in a huff because they had not been able to get the World Fellowship of Buddhists (WFB) to toss out a delegation of Tibetan Buddhists from a biannual gathering.

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