President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday turned down a demand from student protesters that the country’s national security and police chiefs be replaced over what the protesters say was police mishandling of recent pro-independence demonstrations.
Ma said there was room for improvement in the performance of National Security Bureau Director-General Tsai Chao-ming (蔡朝明) and National Police Agency Director-General Wang Cho-chiun (王卓鈞) in handling the demonstrations.
“But this was not to the extent that they should be removed from their posts,” Ma said during an interview with UFO Radio.
Groups of college students have been staging sit-ins since last Thursday to protest against the use of excessive force by police to disperse protesters during the visit of Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) last week.
Students in other parts of the nation joined the protest by staging sit-ins at their respective schools.
A group of students launched a sit-in at the 228 Memorial Park in Chiayi yesterday, making them the sixth student group in the nation to join the campaign after the sit-ins in Hsinchu, Taichung, Tainan and Kaohsiung began on Sunday and Monday.
The students made three demands: that Ma and Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) apologize, that Wang and Tsai step down for what they called the use of “excessive force” by police last week, and that the Assembly and Parade Law (集會遊行法) be amended.
Ma dodged the demand that he and Liu apologize and asked the students to look at “the whole picture” because Chen’s visit was successful, as four agreements were signed and served the public’s interests.
Ma said that Minister of the Interior Liao Liou-yi (廖了以) had on many occasions apologized over the law-enforcement officers’ conduct and promised to review the methods adopted by the police in performing their duties.
On the students’ proposal to change the Assembly and Parade Law, which requires rally organizers to apply for permits from the police, Ma said the idea was consistent with his own proposal that the organizers of such gatherings should be required only to notify police in advance.
However, Ma said the students must recognize the fact that their opinion represents only one of many different views in Taiwan.
The current system is actually very loose, because almost all applications for public rallies are approved, once there is no specific reason to reject them, Ma said.
Meanwhile, the students yesterday urged both the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to propose a specific timetable for when the Assembly and Parade Law would be amended.
In a press release on their official Web blog (action1106.blogspot.com), the students welcomed the legislature’s move to put several proposed amendments to the law to committee review. But the students urged both parties to clearly promise to lift the requirements on gaining approval from law enforcement authorities before holding a rally and eliminate limits on rallies in certain areas and authorization for the police to dismiss a parade.
Article 6 of the law bans any rallies near the Presidential Office, the Executive Yuan, the Examination Yuan, the Judicial Yuan, all courts and residences of the president and vice president. Rallies are also forbidden at international airports, sea ports, important military zones, foreign consulates as well as the offices of any international organization in Taiwan.
“President Ma said yesterday [Tuesday] that the matter of debate was not whether organizers would be allowed to only report their planned rallies but how violence [during rallies could be prevented],” the release said. “This shows that he still takes a conservative stance and [prioritizes] social order while ignoring that the Assembly and Parade Law should be meant to protect freedom of speech.”
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CNA
TRAFFIC SAFETY RULES: A positive result in a drug test would result in a two-year license suspension for the driver and vehicle, and a fine of up to NT$180,000 The Ministry of Transportation and Communications is to authorize police to conduct roadside saliva tests by the end of the year to deter people from driving while under the influence of narcotics, it said yesterday. The ministry last month unveiled a draft of amended regulations governing traffic safety rules and penalties, which included provisions empowering police to conduct mandatory saliva tests on drivers. While currently rules authorize police to use oral fluid testing kits for signs of drug use, they do not establish penalties for noncompliance or operating procedures for officers to follow, the ministry said. The proposed changes to the regulations require
Taipei, New Taipei City, Keelung and Taoyuan would issue a decision at 8pm on whether to cancel work and school tomorrow due to forecasted heavy rain, Keelung Mayor Hsieh Kuo-liang (謝國樑) said today. Hsieh told reporters that absent some pressing reason, the four northern cities would announce the decision jointly at 8pm. Keelung is expected to receive between 300mm and 490mm of rain in the period from 2pm today through 2pm tomorrow, Central Weather Administration data showed. Keelung City Government regulations stipulate that school and work can be canceled if rain totals in mountainous or low-elevation areas are forecast to exceed 350mm in
1.4nm WAFERS: While TSMC is gearing up to expand its overseas production, it would also continue to invest in Taiwan, company chairman and CEO C.C. Wei said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) has applied for permission to construct a new plant in the Central Taiwan Science Park (中部科學園區), which it would use for the production of new high-speed wafers, the National Science and Technology Council said yesterday. The council, which supervises three major science parks in Taiwan, confirmed that the Central Taiwan Science Park Bureau had received an application on Friday from TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, to commence work on the new A14 fab. A14 technology, a 1.4 nanometer (nm) process, is designed to drive artificial intelligence transformation by enabling faster computing and greater power
China Airlines Ltd (CAL) yesterday morning joined SkyTeam’s Aviation Challenge for the fourth time, operating a demonstration flight for “net zero carbon emissions” from Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport to Bangkok. The flight used sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) at a ratio of up to 40 percent, the highest proportion CAL has achieved to date, the nation’s largest carrier said. Since April, SAF has become available to Taiwanese international carriers at Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport), Kaohsiung International Airport and Taoyuan airport. In previous challenges, CAL operated “net zero carbon emission flights” to Singapore and Japan. At a ceremony at Taoyuan airport, China Airlines chief sustainability
RSS