Nearly 100 former Hualon Group employees and their supporters staged a surprise demonstration outside the Presidential Office in Taipei yesterday morning then blocked traffic for half an hour while they called on the government to assist them with their demand that their former employer issue retirement payouts.
“The government is incapable, workers’ New Year is horrible. Give us the retirement payouts we deserve,” about 100 former Hualon employees and their supporters chanted as they arrived unannounced in front of the building and sat down on the street, blocking traffic at about 10am yesterday.
“We’re not here to sabotage or threaten anyone. We are here begging for help from the government,” former Hualon employee Chen Wen-ming (陳文明) said. “As many as 400 of us are owed retirement payouts from our former employer, and according to the law, it’s the government’s job to help us pursue what we deserve, but we are not getting any actual help despite promises from officials over the past years.”
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times
Chen said that in the past few years the workers have sought help from the Legislative Yuan, the Control Yuan, the Executive Yuan, the Presidential Office and the Council of Labor Affairs and while representatives from those agencies all promised to help, the issue remains unresolved.
The workers were soon confronted by busloads of police officers who removed them by force not long after the protest began.
Protesters resisted and clashed with officers, leading to the arrest of Chen Wen-ming, as well as two student activists, Chen Wei-ting (陳為廷) and Chen Kuang-hsuan (陳光軒).
The protest group gathered in front of Renai Road Police Station in the afternoon after learning that the three protesters were taken there after being arrested and waited until they were released.
“It saddens me to see how brutally the police have treated us and those who have supported us,” Hualon Self-Help Association president Lee Tsuei-ming (李翠明) said in front of the police station. “We are only trying to get what we were supposed to receive. It is ridiculous that the police are protecting government officials and capitalists who have repeatedly broken their promises, instead of protecting workers.”
The demonstrators soon ended their action after laying red posters with the character zhai (debt, 債) on the ground.
They said the word was meant to remind the government of the debts that were still owed to the former Hualon workers.
Taipei and New Taipei City government officials are aiming to have the first phase of the Wanhua-Jungho-Shulin Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) line completed and opened by 2027, following the arrival of the first train set yesterday. The 22km-long Light Green Line would connect four densely populated districts in Taipei and New Taipei City: Wanhua (萬華), Jhonghe (中和), Tucheng (土城) and Shulin (樹林). The first phase of the project would connect Wanhua and Jhonghe districts, with Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall and Chukuang (莒光) being the terminal stations. The two municipalities jointly hosted a ceremony for the first train to be used
MILITARY AID: Taiwan has received a first batch of US long-range tactical missiles ahead of schedule, with a second shipment expected to be delivered by 2026 The US’ early delivery of long-range tactical ballistic missiles to Taiwan last month carries political and strategic significance, a military source said yesterday. According to the Ministry of National Defense’s budget report, the batch of military hardware from the US, including 11 sets of M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and 64 MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile Systems, had been scheduled to be delivered to Taiwan between the end of this year and the beginning of next year. However, the first batch arrived last month, earlier than scheduled, with the second batch —18 sets of HIMARS, 20 MGM-140 missiles and 864 M30
Representative to the US Alexander Yui delivered a letter from the government to US president-elect Donald Trump during a meeting with a former Trump administration official, CNN reported yesterday. Yui on Thursday met with former US national security adviser Robert O’Brien over a private lunch in Salt Lake City, Utah, with US Representative Chris Stewart, the Web site of the US cable news channel reported, citing three sources familiar with the matter. “During that lunch the letter was passed along, and then shared with Trump, two of the sources said,” CNN said. O’Brien declined to comment on the lunch, as did the Taipei
A woman who allegedly attacked a high-school student with a utility knife, injuring his face, on a Taipei metro train late on Friday has been transferred to prosecutors, police said yesterday. The incident occurred near MRT Xinpu Station at about 10:17pm on a Bannan Line train headed toward Dingpu, New Taipei City police said. Before police arrived at the station to arrest the suspect, a woman surnamed Wang (王) who is in her early 40s, she had already been subdued by four male passengers, one of whom was an off-duty Taipei police officer, police said. The student, 17, who sustained a cut about
RSS