Former minister of national defense Feng Shih-kuan (馮世寬) has been appointed Veterans Affairs Council minister, Cabinet spokeswoman Kolas Yotaka announced yesterday.
Feng fills the vacancy left by Chiu Kuo-cheng (邱國正), Kolas said.
Chiu was appointed National Security Bureau (NSB) director-general following former bureau head Peng Sheng-chu’s (彭勝竹) resignation last month over a cigarette smuggling scandal.
Several bureau officials have been accused of trying to smuggle more than 10,000 cartons of cigarettes into Taiwan as President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) returned home from an overseas state visit on July 22.
Feng is the chairman of the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, the nation’s first defense think tank, and served as minister of national defense from 2016 to last year.
Feng is a retired lieutenant general and a decorated officer who has served in top posts in the military, including deputy chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces and commander of the Air Force Combatant Command.
He was also chairman of the Aerospace Industrial Development Corp from 2006 to 2008.
Feng is equally familiar with the defense industry and defense technology, Kolas said.
Also, he is adept at business management and has experience promoting international military exchanges, she said, adding that the government hopes he will help enhance international military and veterans’ exchanges.
Honor guards are to stop performing changing of the guard ceremonies around a statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) to avoid “worshiping authoritarianism,” the Ministry of Culture said yesterday. The fate of the bronze statue has long been the subject of fierce and polarizing debate in Taiwan, which has transformed from an autocracy under Chiang into one of Asia’s most vibrant democracies. The changing of the guard each hour at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei is a major tourist attraction, but starting from 9am on Monday, the ceremony is to be moved outdoors to Democracy Boulevard, outside the eponymous blue-and-white memorial
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) supports peaceful unification with China, and President William Lai (賴清德) is “a bit naive” for being a “practical worker for Taiwanese independence,” former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in an interview published yesterday. Asked about whether the KMT is on the same page as the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on the issue of Taiwanese independence or unification with China, Ma told the Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper Sin Chew Daily that they are not. While the KMT supports peaceful unification and is against unification by force, the DPP opposes unification as such and
The annual Taipei Summer Festival, which starts today, is to tone down its fireworks displays, the Taipei Department of Information and Tourism said on Monday. Fireworks displays are to be held at the riverside site in Datong District’s (大同) Dadaocheng (大稻埕) area on four days at this year’s festival, with the first today, and then on Wednesday next week, July 31 and Aug. 10, the department said. There were eight displays last year, with the reduction aimed at minimizing inconvenience to local residents, it said. The first three shows, which are all on Wednesdays, are to last for five minutes, while the final
EYE ON MAYORS: The DPP would file a complaint with the Control Yuan against Ko and Chiang over their handling of reports of abuse at a preschool in the city The Taipei City Government’s belated response under Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) and his predecessor, Taiwan People’s Party Chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), to alleged child sex abuse at a kindergarten resulted in more children being victimized, two Taipei City Councilors said yesterday. A Taipei preschool teacher has been charged with sexually abusing six children from 2021 to last year at a school registered to his mother. Prosecutors are reportedly considering additional charges amid a wave of new accusations allegedly linking the suspect to 20 other abused children and the discovery at his residence of more than 600 sexually explicit videos featuring minors. The