In light of increasingly frequent media reports about cruelty to animals, lawmakers across party lines passed a resolution on Thursday demanding the Council of Agriculture (COA) set up an animal protection division to improve care for stray animals. They threatened not to review the council’s budget if it fails to do so.
A survey conducted by the Environment and Animal Society of Taiwan (EAST) over the past three years found that 104 of 122 animal shelters around the nation failed to meet the standards of the Animal Protection Act (動物保護法).
More than 90 percent of the temporary animal detention centers designated by local governments to keep stray animals do not meet the minimum requirements, EAST said.
EAST showed the legislature’s Economic Affairs Committee video clips of dogs and cats being kept in local government-operated centers near garbage fields, cemeteries and slaughterhouses. Some of the animals were fed rotten food and dirty water or were left to die.
At present, environmental protection workers responsible for garbage are also responsible for catching stray dogs and cats.
EAST said the government should set up a agency dedicated to animal protection to deal with the stray animal problem, which has become increasingly serious as people abandon their pets when they find the animals to troublesome or costly to deal with.
Council of Agriculture Vice Minister Wang Cheng-ten (王政騰) said animals placed in animal shelters or local governments centers are humanely killed if they are not claimed or adopted in seven days.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Shyu Jong-shyoung (徐中雄) questioned the council’s attitude, noting that earmarked only NT$370 million (US$11.4 million) over the past 10 years to deal with stray animals and just NT$10 million last year.
Committee members suggested the council deliver a report on how it plans to improve animal shelters and treatment of strays, including stringently punishing people who abuse animals or animal protection workers who neglect their jobs. The lawmakers suggested the council setting up a complaint hotline and drawing up a timetable for establishing an animal protection agency.
If the council fails to follow through on the suggestions, the lawmakers said they would boycott the council’s budget.
There are 77 incidents of Taiwanese travelers going missing in China between January last year and last month, the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) said. More than 40 remain unreachable, SEF Secretary-General Luo Wen-jia (羅文嘉) said on Friday. Most of the reachable people in the more than 30 other incidents were allegedly involved in fraud, while some had disappeared for personal reasons, Luo said. One of these people is Kuo Yu-hsuan (郭宇軒), a 22-year-old Taiwanese man from Kaohsiung who went missing while visiting China in August. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office last month said in a news statement that he was under investigation
An aviation jacket patch showing a Formosan black bear punching Winnie the Pooh has become popular overseas, including at an aviation festival held by the Japan Air Self-Defense Force at the Ashiya Airbase yesterday. The patch was designed last year by Taiwanese designer Hsu Fu-yu (徐福佑), who said that it was inspired by Taiwan’s countermeasures against frequent Chinese military aircraft incursions. The badge shows a Formosan black bear holding a Republic of China flag as it punches Winnie the Pooh — a reference to Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) — who is dressed in red and is holding a honey pot with
Celebrations marking Double Ten National Day are to begin in Taipei today before culminating in a fireworks display in Yunlin County on the night of Thursday next week. To start the celebrations, a concert is to be held at the Taipei Dome at 4pm today, featuring a lineup of award-winning singers, including Jody Chiang (江蕙), Samingad (紀曉君) and Huang Fei (黃妃), Taipei tourism bureau official Chueh Yu-ling (闕玉玲) told a news conference yesterday. School choirs, including the Pqwasan na Taoshan Choir and Hngzyang na Matui & Nahuy Children’s Choir, and the Ministry of National Defense Symphony Orchestra, flag presentation unit and choirs,
China is attempting to subsume Taiwanese culture under Chinese culture by promulgating legislation on preserving documents on ties between the Minnan region and Taiwan, a Taiwanese academic said yesterday. China on Tuesday enforced the Fujian Province Minnan and Taiwan Document Protection Act to counter Taiwanese cultural independence with historical evidence that would root out misleading claims, Chinese-language media outlet Straits Today reported yesterday. The act is “China’s first ad hoc local regulations in the cultural field that involve Taiwan and is a concrete step toward implementing the integrated development demonstration zone,” Fujian Provincial Archives deputy director Ma Jun-fan (馬俊凡) said. The documents