The latest poll from the Taiwan Indicator Survey Research (TISR) suggested that support for ceasing the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in Gongliao District (貢寮), New Taipei City (新北市), increased by 4 percentage points from a previous poll conducted in March.
TISR general manager Tai Li-an (戴立安) said that the percentage of people opposed to completing the nuclear plant increased from 58 percent in March to 62 percent last month.
The government’s efforts to persuade the public that the plant is safe are not only ineffective, they are actually causing more people to be worried, Tai said.
On the issue of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government’s and Taiwan Power Co’s joint efforts to persuade the public of the overall safety of nuclear power, the latest poll showed that 73.6 percent of respondents were not swayed by the government’s arguments.
Only 9.1 percent indicated that they have changed their minds, 4 percent of whom said that they had gone from questioning to flat-out opposition. Only 1.9 percent said they were persuaded by President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration, the survey showed.
The poll also showed that Ma’s low public approval ratings have not rebounded, with only 19 percent of respondents satisfied with his administration and 73.4 percent dissatisfied.
Meanwhile, only 24.9 percent said they have faith in the government, while 60.2 percent have no confidence in the government.
The survey was conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday through random telephone samplings of 1,005 residents who were older than 20 spread across the nation, Tai said.
The poll has a 95 percent confidence interval and a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
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