More than 200 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) supporters yesterday protested outside the office of Taoyuan City Councilor Wang Hao-yu (王浩宇), a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) member, angered by his Facebook post about the late Kaohsiung City Council speaker Hsu Kun-yuan (許崑源).
Protesters outside Wang’s office in Jhongli District (中壢) said the post made light of Hsu’s death on Saturday night, hours after the recall election of Kaohsiung mayor Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜).
“Staunchly support Han Kuo-yu! Kaohsiung City Council Speaker Hsu Kun-yuan has died after falling from a building,” Wang wrote.
Photo: Lee Jung-ping, Taipei Times
DPP Taipei City Councilor Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) has also come under fire for a Facebook post on Saturday asking if Hsu’s death was linked to gambling debts. Liang deleted the post and issued an apology later that night.
KMT Taoyuan City Councilor Chan Chiang-tsun (詹江村) and former KMT legislator Wu Yu-jen (吳育仁) yesterday called on supporters to protest in front of Wang’s office.
Wang had made similar remarks in the past, which showed he was unfit to hold office, Chan said, citing a post about a protester against pension reforms who fell from a building and died in 2018, and a post after former premier Hau Pei-tsun (郝柏村) died in March.
Wang’s office closed for the day, and at about noon the Jhongli Police Precinct erected barricades in front of the office, restricted traffic on the road in front of it to one direction and deployed a large number of officers at the site as a precautionary measure.
More than 200 people showed up to protest. After reading condolences for Hsu, some of them began yelling insults at Wang’s office, calling for his recall and throwing eggs at the building.
The crowd became agitated after Wu and two others were taken away by police for contravening the Social Order Maintenance Act (社會秩序維護法).
Separately, about 50 members of the Blue Sky Action Alliance, the pro-unification Concentric Patriotism Association and other groups protested outside Liang’s office in Taipei’s Datong District (大同), calling for his recall.
Liang’s office, which was closed, issued a statement saying Liang respected the protesters’ views and asked for them to remain calm.
In other developments, Han led Kaohsiung City Government officials in paying respects to Hsu at a funeral hall in the city, where he recited chants from Buddhism’s Heart Sutra (心經) for an hour.
New Power Party Kaohsiung City Councilor Huang Jie (黃捷) also visited the funeral home to pay respects to Hsu, but was criticized by Wu Chiu-li (吳秋麗), an official in Kaohsiung’s Legal Affairs Department, for wearing red lipstick to the wake and not wearing a mask while inside.
Additional reporting by Chen Wen-chan and Kuo An-chia
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
Ferry operators are planning to provide a total of 1,429 journeys between Taiwan proper and its offshore islands to meet increased travel demand during the upcoming Lunar New Year holiday, the Maritime and Port Bureau said yesterday. The available number of ferry journeys on eight routes from Saturday next week to Feb. 2 is expected to meet a maximum transport capacity of 289,414 passengers, the bureau said in a news release. Meanwhile, a total of 396 journeys on the "small three links," which are direct ferries connecting Taiwan's Kinmen and Lienchiang counties with China's Fujian Province, are also being planned to accommodate
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
RSS