Advocates lobbying for cannabis decriminalization organized a series of activities this past week to promote the “Green Sensation” Festival tomorrow, including a march around the Legislative Yuan in the afternoon.
Every year “420 International Weed Day” is marked around the world on April 20, and the Taipei event is to have music entertainment, speeches, display booths and vendors to create a “fun street fair” starting at noontime and running until evening, Green Sensation spokesman Chung Ho-yun (鍾和耘) said yesterday.
Kaohsiung-based rapper Savage M and Taiwanese metalcore band Setback Line are the headliners, with hip hop artists BR and IronBoss, Thaiboy41, Acrack 47 and other entertainers also playing, Chung said, as he called on activists for personal liberty and supporters of medical and recreational use of cannabis to attend the march and activities.
Photo: Jason Pan, Taipei Times
The event has received official approval after submitting an application, which permits the organizers to hold the street fair at the south side of the Legislative Yuan on Jinan Road.
The march will begin at 4:20pm and walk around the whole block before returning back to the street fair, Chung said.
“Taiwan is a free, democratic country, and citizens have the freedom of expression and personal liberty. So we have the right to hold the 420 event each year, to advocate for decriminalization, and for medical use of cannabis, although the authorities and their outdated laws still treat it as a narcotic, instead of a natural medicine as it is,” he added.
Chung said his group and supporters want Taiwan to join the many advanced nations that have decriminalized cannabis, or permit its use for medical purposes or for personal consumption.
These include Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Jamaica, Mexico, Uruguay, Argentina, South Africa, Australia, Thailand and many US states.
They listed their demands for Taiwan to gradually relax the prohibition on the natural plant cannabis sativa and products derived from it, starting by stopping the stigmatization of personal consumption; to conform to global decriminalization trends by removing it as a Category 2 narcotic drugs; and raise the allowable level at current 10ppm for tetrahydrocannabinol in hemp products to the same level as US at 3,000ppm.
Asked about the prospect for changing the law under the new administration, as president-elect William Lai (賴清德) is to be inaugurated next month, Chung said he hopes to see a reassessment of cannabis and drugs policies, “but we don’t have much hope for change, because the designated new justice minister Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) comes from the same conservative mindset of the Taiwan justice system, and they are rigidly fixed in viewing cannabis as an ‘evil narcotic.’”
Meanwhile, the nation’s “weed lawyer” and Green Party member Zoe Lee (李菁琪) on Sunday convened a discussion with audience members during the Taiwan International Democratic Film Festival in Taipei, after screening the 2018 US documentary film Breaking Habits, a film about Sister Kate and her commune of nuns in California who ran a cannabis farm. The nuns produced medical marijuana to help treat people with cancer and other major illnesses.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), spokeswoman Yang Chih-yu (楊智伃) and Legislator Hsieh Lung-chieh (謝龍介) would be summoned by police for questioning for leading an illegal assembly on Thursday evening last week, Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) said today. The three KMT officials led an assembly outside the Taipei City Prosecutors’ Office, a restricted area where public assembly is not allowed, protesting the questioning of several KMT staff and searches of KMT headquarters and offices in a recall petition forgery case. Chu, Yang and Hsieh are all suspected of contravening the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) by holding
PRAISE: Japanese visitor Takashi Kubota said the Taiwanese temple architecture images showcased in the AI Art Gallery were the most impressive displays he saw Taiwan does not have an official pavilion at the World Expo in Osaka, Japan, because of its diplomatic predicament, but the government-backed Tech World pavilion is drawing interest with its unique recreations of works by Taiwanese artists. The pavilion features an artificial intelligence (AI)-based art gallery showcasing works of famous Taiwanese artists from the Japanese colonial period using innovative technologies. Among its main simulated displays are Eastern gouache paintings by Chen Chin (陳進), Lin Yu-shan (林玉山) and Kuo Hsueh-hu (郭雪湖), who were the three young Taiwanese painters selected for the East Asian Painting exhibition in 1927. Gouache is a water-based
Taiwan would welcome the return of Honduras as a diplomatic ally if its next president decides to make such a move, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. “Of course, we would welcome Honduras if they want to restore diplomatic ties with Taiwan after their elections,” Lin said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, when asked to comment on statements made by two of the three Honduran presidential candidates during the presidential campaign in the Central American country. Taiwan is paying close attention to the region as a whole in the wake of a
OFF-TARGET: More than 30,000 participants were expected to take part in the Games next month, but only 6,550 foreign and 19,400 Taiwanese athletes have registered Taipei city councilors yesterday blasted the organizers of next month’s World Masters Games over sudden timetable and venue changes, which they said have caused thousands of participants to back out of the international sporting event, among other organizational issues. They also cited visa delays and political interference by China as reasons many foreign athletes are requesting refunds for the event, to be held from May 17 to 30. Jointly organized by the Taipei and New Taipei City governments, the games have been rocked by numerous controversies since preparations began in 2020. Taipei City Councilor Lin Yen-feng (林延鳳) said yesterday that new measures by
RSS