Most people have no idea what issues will be covered in cross-strait talks scheduled to take place in Taichung next week, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday.
The DPP accused the government of disregarding the principle of transparency in its dealings with China and said it was not surprising that President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) approval rating has plunged to 20 percent.
A recent poll conducted by the party said 87.6 percent of the 956 respondents did not know what would be discussed at the meeting between Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) Chairman Chiang Pin-kung (江丙坤) and Beijing’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS) Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林).
PHOTO: LIAO CHEN-HUEI, TAIPEI TIMES
This will be the fourth round of cross-strait negotiations since the Ma administration came to power last May. The two sides are scheduled to discuss and sign four agreements on fishing industry cooperation, quality checks for agricultural products, cross-strait cooperation in inspection and certification and avoiding double taxation. Issues concerning the government’s proposed economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with Beijing will also be discussed.
The DPP poll showed that less than 30 percent of respondents believe signing the trade pact would benefit Taiwan.
Sixty-five percent of respondents said the government should not interfere with people’s right to protest during the Chiang-Chen meeting, DPP poll center director Chen Chun-lin (陳俊麟) said.
DPP spokeswoman Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴), meanwhile, accused Ma of being insincere for not issuing a formal invitation to DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) to hold an open debate about the ECFA.
In a television interview last week, Ma said he would be happy to enter into a debate or any other form of discussion with Tsai on the ECFA.
Hsiao said Ma was making empty promises, because so far the Presidential Office had not formally invited Tsai to a debate.
The DPP spokeswoman also accused Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) of being arrogant, saying he had rejected college students’ invitation to a debate on the issue.
“Wu’s unwillingness to communicate with the people shows his pompous and arrogant mentality. Moreover, it highlights that the ECFA is nothing but an under-the-table deal,” she said.
She said that any cross-strait agreement, especially an ECFA, would have a significant impact on Taiwan, and therefore the government had to ensure that the negotiation process is open and transparent.
Legislators from both the DPP and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday urged the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) to devise better ways to explain the ECFA to the public and to make the content of the agreement easier to understand.
CLA Minister Jennifer Wang (王如玄) and other officials answered lawmakers’ questions about the council’s public hearings on the controversial pact at the legislature’s Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene Committee meeting.
The council has recently held several public hearings to explain the content of the ECFA to labor groups and local unions, as well as how it would affect the labor market and various local industries.
KMT Legislator Lin Hung-chih (林鴻池) cited recent surveys and said that despite the government’s efforts to promote the agreement, most people were still unclear about what the ECFA was about.
“Some labor representatives who attended the [ECFA] hearings told me that they heard, but did not understand,” he said.
DPP Legislator Wang Sing-nan (王幸男) said the government’s glossing over of details had left the public confused.
Lawmakers from both parties questioned the effectiveness of the hearings, saying that photos taken at the hearings showed many people were so bored listening to the officials that they fell asleep.
KMT Legislator Ho Tsai-feng (侯彩鳳) said council officials should devise better methods to present the idea in a clear and easy to understand way, so that “even those who are illiterate would be able to understand.”
SEND A MESSAGE: Sinking the amphibious assault ship, the lead warship of its class, is meant to show China the US Navy is capable of sinking their ships, an analyst said The US and allied navies plan to sink a 40,000-tonne ship at the latest Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercise to simulate defeating a Chinese amphibious assault on Taiwan. This year’s RIMPAC — the 29th iteration of the world’s largest naval exercise — involves the US, 28 partners, more than 25,000 personnel, 40 warships, three submarines and more than 150 aircraft operating in and around Hawaii from yesterday to Aug. 1, the US Navy said in a press release. The major components of the event include multidomain warfare exercises in multiship surface engagements, anti-submarine warfare and multi-axis defense of a carrier strike
Taiwanese could risk being extradited to China when traveling in countries with close ties to Beijing, Taiwan Association of University Professors deputy chairman Chen Li-fu (陳俐甫) said on Friday. Chen’s comments came after China on Friday last week announced new judicial guidelines targeting Taiwanese independence advocates. Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and Djibouti are among the countries where Taiwanese could risk being extradited to China, he said. The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday elevated the travel alert for China, Hong Kong and Macau to “orange” after Beijing announced its guidelines to “severely punish Taiwanese independence diehards for splitting the country and inciting secession.” Extradition treaties
The airspace around Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport and Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) is to be closed for an hour on July 25 and July 23 respectively, due to the Han Kuang military exercises, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday. The annual exercise is to be held on Taiwan proper and its outlying islands from July 22 to 26. During last year’s exercise, the military conducted anti-aircraft landing drills at the Taoyuan airport for the first time, for which a one-hour no-fly ban was issued. Based on a live-fire bulletin sent out by the Maritime and Port Bureau, the nation’s
CROSS-BORDER CRIME: The suspects cannot be charged with cybercrime in Indonesia as their targets were in Malaysia, an Indonesian immigration director said Indonesian immigration authorities have detained 103 Taiwanese after a raid at a villa on Bali, officials said yesterday. They were accused of misusing their visas and residence permits, and are suspected of possible cybercrimes, Safar Muhammad Godam, director of immigration supervision and enforcement at the Indonesian Ministry of Law and Human Rights told reporters at a news conference. “The 103 foreign nationals stayed at the villa and conducted suspicious activities, which we suspect are activities related to cybercrime activities,” he said, presenting laptops and routers at the news conference. Godam said Indonesian authorities cannot charge them with conducting cybercrime. “During the inspection, we