The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday accused the government of conducting “surveillance of the opposition” after the installation of CCTV cameras in front of its office in the Legislative Yuan in Taipei.
KMT Legislator Alex Fai (費鴻泰) told a conference outside the legislative chamber that the cameras which have facial recognition and sound recording capabilities were installed without the caucus’ assent.
The lack of such devices outside the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus office just down the corridor suggests the decision was politically motivated, Fai said, asking: “When did Taiwan become a police state?”
KMT caucus secretary-general Chen Li-wen (鄭麗文)
<strong>April 19 to April 25</strong>
Taipei’s Dalongdong Baoan Temple (大龍峒保安宮) was in a sorry state following the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) retreat to Taiwan in 1949. About 200 refugees and military dependents had taken over the 119-year-old structure and set up camp in makeshift dwellings.
When writer Wu Chao-lun (吳朝綸) moved to Dalongdong in 1950, he saw “little incense burning; it was extremely crowded … and there was barely any space to sit. They washed their clothes with dirty water and hung them up still dripping. This is not only blasphemous, but unsanitary.”
To save the temple, locals put together a restoration
Frontline health workers need voice, alliance says
By Lee I-chia / Staff reporter
Frontline healthcare workers should be on the National Health Insurance Committee, the Taiwan Medical Alliance for Labor Justice and Patient Safety said yesterday, urging the National Health Insurance Administration (NHIA) to include them.
The fifth list of committee members was released on Friday last week, consisting of 39 members from four groups: representatives of “the insured,” “healthcare service providers,” “government officials” and “specialists and trusted third parties.”
Alliance director-general Lin Ping-hung (林秉鴻) said that although half of the committee members are new to the list, it continued to exclude healthcare workers, so decisions are made by a “tripartite agreement” of the government, healthcare facility management and people who have National Health Insurance coverage.
Legislators pass bill to protect seafarers from acts of piracy
By Hsieh Chun-lin, Chien Hui-jui and Jonathan Chin / Staff reporters, with staff writer
The Legislative Yuan yesterday passed amendments to the Seafarers Act (船員法) that would require the owner of a vessel to obtain the crew’s written consent before a ship not protected by armed contractors sets sail in waters threatened by piracy or other unlawful forces.
Article 87 of the act stated that the owner of a vessel must obtain the written consent of the crew to operate the ship in a war zone. The amendment expands that requirement to waters threatened by piracy and illegal armed forces.