Students stormed Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) headquarters in Taipei yesterday, escalating a protest over controversial amendments to the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法).
About 20 students from groups affiliated with the Workers’ Struggle Alliance scuffled with police guarding the glass doors lead to the DPP’s offices, shouting for President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) to come out and face them over the party’s plan to cut the number of national holidays per year from 19 to 12.
The cuts would be implemented following the passage of a bill that is part of reforms to implement a 40-hour workweek, with a final vote possible as soon as next week after the expiration of a one-month waiting period imposed after cross-caucus negotiations.
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
Protesters occupied a reception area at the DPP offices shortly after noon, prior to a meeting of the DPP Central Standing Committee, after reportedly failing to force their way down to a lower floor where the meeting was to be held.
They pasted slogans across foyer walls and doors, occasionally shouting slogans in between speeches.
“The main reason [for the occupation] is the response we received from [DPP caucus whip] Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) yesterday [Tuesday] and the fact that we have protested in front of DPP headquarters many times, but have never received a response,” Taiwan Higher Education Union student action committee member Su Tzu-hsuan (蘇子軒) said.
Ker on Tuesday said he was only willing to discuss the amendments with other legislators, after protesters briefly occupied one of his offices at the Legislative Yuan to demand a public debate.
The protesters also criticized statements by Legislative Speaker Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全), who said Tuesday’s occupation was unacceptable, as a legislator’s office constitutes “private space.”
“If offices were truly ‘private space,’ then Su as legislative speaker should not have issued an official condemnation and the fact that he did not shows that they at least partially belong to the public,” Su Tzu-hsuan said, threatening that the protesters would follow DPP members “like shadows” if they failed to respond.
“We have to draw a line between ourselves and this ‘capitalist’ party that is advancing the interests of the wealthy, meeting secretly with business groups and capitalists, rather than listening to young people,” he said.
The protesters occupied the foyer for about an hour before attempting to stage a retreat, only to be blocked briefly by police officers before they were allowed to quietly trickle into the elevators.
DPP officials reportedly asked the police to refrain from dragging the students out of the building.
Su said the protesters staged a voluntary retreat after it became apparent there was “absolutely no way” that they would meet with Tsai.
DPP spokesman Juan Chao-hsiung (阮昭雄) said the party respected the protesters’ opinions and their right to freedom of expression.
“We respect different opinions and believe these young people have fully expressed theirs,” Juan said when asked why no DPP officials tried to communicate with the protesters.
Tsai did not comment on the protest during the committee meeting, Juan said.
Additional reporting by Chen Wei-han
ENDEAVOR MANTA: The ship is programmed to automatically return to its designated home port and would self-destruct if seized by another party The Endeavor Manta, Taiwan’s first military-specification uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) tailor-made to operate in the Taiwan Strait in a bid to bolster the nation’s asymmetric combat capabilities made its first appearance at Kaohsiung’s Singda Harbor yesterday. Taking inspiration from Ukraine’s navy, which is using USVs to force Russia’s Black Sea fleet to take shelter within its own ports, CSBC Taiwan (台灣國際造船) established a research and development unit on USVs last year, CSBC chairman Huang Cheng-hung (黃正弘) said. With the exception of the satellite guidance system and the outboard motors — which were purchased from foreign companies that were not affiliated with Chinese-funded
PERMIT REVOKED: The influencer at a news conference said the National Immigration Agency was infringing on human rights and persecuting Chinese spouses Chinese influencer “Yaya in Taiwan” (亞亞在台灣) yesterday evening voluntarily left Taiwan, despite saying yesterday morning that she had “no intention” of leaving after her residence permit was revoked over her comments on Taiwan being “unified” with China by military force. The Ministry of the Interior yesterday had said that it could forcibly deport the influencer at midnight, but was considering taking a more flexible approach and beginning procedures this morning. The influencer, whose given name is Liu Zhenya (劉振亞), departed on a 8:45pm flight from Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) to Fuzhou, China. Liu held a news conference at the airport at 7pm,
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
Taiwan was ranked the fourth-safest country in the world with a score of 82.9, trailing only Andorra, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in Numbeo’s Safety Index by Country report. Taiwan’s score improved by 0.1 points compared with last year’s mid-year report, which had Taiwan fourth with a score of 82.8. However, both scores were lower than in last year’s first review, when Taiwan scored 83.3, and are a long way from when Taiwan was named the second-safest country in the world in 2021, scoring 84.8. Taiwan ranked higher than Singapore in ninth with a score of 77.4 and Japan in 10th with