Hundreds of people marked the first anniversary of the signing of the cross-strait service trade agreement with a protest outside the Legislative Yuan in Taipei last night.
Decorating the stage with ornaments traditionally used for funeral events, such as white banners, pairs of paper dolls, mini pagodas and canned drinks, the protesters, mobilized by the Black Island Youth Front and the Taiwan March and Democracy Tautin, started the rally with a student dressed in a Taoist priest’s outfit performing an exorcism.
“May the cross-strait service trade agreement have a safe passage to the underworld,” he said. “May the free economic pilot zones perish. President Ma Ying-jeou’s [馬英九] government, go ahead and cross the bridge.”
Photo: Chen Chih-chu, Taipei Times
The crowd, many who also took part in the 23-day occupation of the legislative floor in March, shouted chants that are usually cited during funerals.
The call for the government to cross the bridge comes from the folk belief that there is a bridge connecting the world of the living and the world of the dead. Since the spirits of the newly dead are confused, not knowing where to go, the Taoist priest and the family of the deceased must shout to direct him or her to cross the bridge to the underworld.
“The purpose of the ritual is to send away all the ‘dirty things,’ and the dirtiest thing in this country is the government under Ma’s leadership,” said Dennis Wei (魏揚), a Sunflower movement student leader. “If the government hasn’t learned its lesson by attempting to pass the cross-strait service trade agreement and it still want to pass the pilot zones plan by force, we will not hesitate to fight it.”
Photo: Chen Chih-chu, Taipei Times
One of the reasons the groups organized the rally is because Ma, who doubles as chairman of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), had earlier asked the KMT caucus to put all its efforts into passing the cross-strait service trade agreement and the bills on pilot zones during an extra legislative session which started last week and is scheduled to last three weeks, Wei said.
Taiwan Association of University Professors chairman Lu Chung-chin (呂忠津) expressed his concern about the negative impact that the two economic plans might have on the nation.
“The so-called pilot zones are actually a backdoor for privileged commercial groups and through these groups China can apply its political influence bit by bit,” Lu said. “Instead of taking up its responsibilities to boost the declining economy, the Ma administration has unilaterally decided to play the game of patronage, bringing in Chinese forces and helping them take over Taiwan through economic means.”
Between speeches, several independent musicians and bands performed to show their support for the protesters.
To prevent the occupation of the legislature from happening again, police surrounded the legislature with barbed-wire barricades more than a week ago. In the afternoon, police reinforced the barricades by fixing them to the ground, connecting them together and blocking most of the gates that lead to legislative compound.
A police source said that in addition to the regular force stationed at the Legislative Yuan, as many as 360 more officers were deployed.
GEARING UP: An invasion would be difficult and would strain China’s forces, but it has conducted large-scale training supporting an invasion scenario, the report said China increased its military pressure on Taiwan last year and took other steps in preparation for a potential invasion, an annual report published by the US Department of Defense on Wednesday showed. “Throughout 2023, Beijing continued to erode longstanding norms in and around Taiwan by employing a range of pressure tactics against Taiwan,” the report said, which is titled “Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China (PRC) 2024.” The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) “is preparing for a contingency to unify Taiwan with the PRC by force, if perceived as necessary by Beijing, while simultaneously deterring, delaying or denying
‘LAGGING BEHIND’: The NATO secretary-general called on democratic allies to be ‘clear-eyed’ about Beijing’s military buildup, urging them to boost military spending NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte mentioning China’s bullying of Taiwan and its ambition to reshape the global order has significance during a time when authoritarian states are continuously increasing their aggression, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. In a speech at the Carnegie Europe think tank in Brussels on Thursday, Rutte said Beijing is bullying Taiwan and would start to “nibble” at Taiwan if Russia benefits from a post-invasion peace deal with Ukraine. He called on democratic allies to boost defense investments and also urged NATO members to increase defense spending in the face of growing military threats from Russia
PEACEFUL RESOLUTION: A statement issued following a meeting between Australia and Britain reiterated support for Taiwan and opposition to change in the Taiwan Strait Canada should support the peaceful resolution of Taiwan’s destiny according to the will of Taiwanese, Canadian lawmakers said in a resolution marking the second anniversary of that nation’s Indo-Pacific strategy on Monday. The Canadian House of Commons committee on Canada-Chinese relations made the comment as part of 34 recommendations for the new edition of the strategy, adding that Ottawa should back Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations. Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, first published in October 2022, emphasized that the region’s security, trade, human rights, democracy and environmental protection would play a crucial role in shaping Canada’s future. The strategy called for Canada to deepen
TECH CONFERENCE: Input from industry and academic experts can contribute to future policymaking across government agencies, President William Lai said Multifunctional service robots could be the next new area in which Taiwan could play a significant role, given its strengths in chip manufacturing and software design, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman and chief executive C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said yesterday. “In the past two months, our customers shared a lot of their future plans with me. Artificial intelligence [AI] and AI applications were the most talked about subjects in our conversation,” Wei said in a speech at the National Science and Technology Conference in Taipei. TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, counts Nvidia Corp, Advanced Micro Devices Inc, Apple Inc and
RSS