Pro-independence advocates called for a million Taiwanese people to take to the streets on Feb. 28 to demand that China dismantle hundreds of missiles aimed at Taiwan. They made the call while unveiling a logo for the proposed rally yesterday.
"The national alliance upholding President Chen Shui-bian (
PHOTO: CHIANG YING-YING, TAIPEI TIMES
The rally was proposed in support of a defensive referendum proposed by President Chen, Ng said.
"We look forward to seeing 1 million Taiwanese join in the rally to show our unity and determination to safeguard Taiwan, and support the president in his goal of furthering the nation's advancement on democracy, freedom, peace and civil liberties," he said.
Ng's alliance unveiled the logo designed for the proposed rally yesterday.
"The logo comprises the color green to show Taiwan's prosperity, vitality and a desire for peace; the color orange to illustrate the warmth and sincerity of the rally spirit; and the color black that symbolizes Taiwanese people's long struggle against adversity and external threat," Democratic Progressive Party Deputy Secretary General Lee Ying-yuan (
The national alliance in support of the DPP president planned the 228 rally in reference to 2 million people from Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia rallying together in 1989 to show their determination to be independent from the Soviet Union.
The rally aims at gathering 1 million people on the First Route of Taiwan that connects most cities in western Taiwan, from Keelung to Pingtung County, on Feb. 28 to declare Taiwan's determination to defend itself to the world and Beijing.
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it is fully aware of the situation following reports that the son of ousted Chinese politician Bo Xilai (薄熙來) has arrived in Taiwan and is to marry a Taiwanese. Local media reported that Bo Guagua (薄瓜瓜), son of the former member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, is to marry the granddaughter of Luodong Poh-Ai Hospital founder Hsu Wen-cheng (許文政). The pair met when studying abroad and arranged to get married this year, with the wedding breakfast to be held at The One holiday resort in Hsinchu
The Taipei Zoo on Saturday said it would pursue legal action against a man who was filmed climbing over a railing to tease and feed spotted hyenas in their enclosure earlier that day. In videos uploaded to social media on Saturday, a man can be seen climbing over a protective railing and approaching a ledge above the zoo’s spotted hyena enclosure, before dropping unidentified objects down to two of the animals. The Taipei Zoo in a statement said the man’s actions were “extremely inappropriate and even illegal.” In addition to monitoring the hyenas’ health, the zoo would collect evidence provided by the public
A decision to describe a Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement on Singapore’s Taiwan policy as “erroneous” was made because the city-state has its own “one China policy” and has not followed Beijing’s “one China principle,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Chung-kwang (田中光) said yesterday. It has been a longstanding practice for the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to speak on other countries’ behalf concerning Taiwan, Tien said. The latest example was a statement issued by the PRC after a meeting between Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on the sidelines of the APEC summit
A road safety advocacy group yesterday called for reforms to the driver licensing and retraining system after a pedestrian was killed and 15 other people were injured in a two-bus collision in Taipei. “Taiwan’s driver’s licenses are among the easiest to obtain in the world, and there is no mandatory retraining system for drivers,” Taiwan Vision Zero Alliance, a group pushing to reduce pedestrian fatalities, said in a news release. Under the regulations, people who have held a standard car driver’s license for two years and have completed a driver training course are eligible to take a test