TAIPEI Marcus Cooper Youth Jersey , Jan. 16 (Xinhua) -- Taiwan residents began voting in the island's leadership and legislature elections at 8 a.m. on Saturday and the polls will close at 4 p.m.


In a three-way race to become Taiwan's next leader, Eric Chu of the Kuomintang, the island's ruling party since 2008, is competing with major opposition Democratic Progressive Party chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen and the minority People First Party chairman James Soong.


Chu, Tsai and Soong cast ballots in New Taipei.


More than 15,000 polling stations are open across the island. About 18 million residents are eligible to vote for the island's next leader and members of the legislature but it is hard to estimate how many voters will turn up Tom Compton Youth Jersey , according to the election commission.


In 2012, ballots were cast by just under three-quarters of potential voters.


After a rainy week, Taipei welcomed light sunshine on Saturday morning, which is expected to encourage more voters to come forward.


At a polling station in a small neighborhood of central Taipei, residents began lining up at the front door shortly after opening time. Several senior citizens queued in wheelchairs accompanied by family members while a young mother carried her baby.


"My biggest expectation of the new leader -- don't fight with the mainland," said a middle-aged voter who identified himself with the surname Liu.


Hsu Cheng-wen Dion Sims Youth Jersey , a businessman who runs a company in the mainland, came home specially for the voting. "I care about cross-Strait relations the most. I hope the new leader will stick to the 1992 Consensus, which is the foundation for a favorable and stable cross-Strait ties," he said.


Hsiao Chih-ying, a 29-year-old electronic engineer, held a similar view. "I hope politicians do not provoke confrontation between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait and that Taiwan can continue to be open and inclusive Quintin Demps Youth Jersey ," said Hsiao, who was to board a bus from Taipei to Hingchu to cast a ballot.


The voting was proceeding smoothly as of 11 a.m.


The legislature election is being held simultaneously, with 377 candidates running for 79 directly elected regional seats and seats for ethnic minority groups, and 179 candidates from 18 parties, the most ever, vying for 34 at-large seats. Taiwan's legislature has 113 seats.


Each eligible voter will cast two ballots in the legislature election -- one for a candidate representing the voter's district and the other for a political party to decide how many at-large seats each party can obtain.


Voting results will be announced before 10 p.m. Kendall Wright Youth Jersey , according to the island's election commission.

ing any foreign individual whose communications are hosted by cloud services located in the United States."


Leaked documents show that many countries, including Germany, South Korea and Japan have been targeted by the NSA's eavesdropping, and that the intelligence agencies of the United States and some European countries have joined hands to launch massive network monitoring and phone-tapping operations that severely undermine the network security of all countries.


Norwegian media have reported that Norway is also a target of US surveillance. The NSA collected data from more than 33 million mobile phone calls made in Norway between December 10, 2012, and January 8 Mike Glennon Youth Jersey , 2013.


The Italian weekly L'Espresso has reported that British and US intelligence agencies have been massively bugging Italian telephone communications and network data.


3. Monitoring international companies


The US government does not just target the Internet, but also key industries such as finance, transport, electricity and education.


Documents leaked by Snowden show that the NSA's eavesdropping not only targeted overseas politicians but also international organizations and business leaders.


The German weekly Der Spiegel reported that financial transactions, especially credit card deals, were among the targets of NSA surveillance programs. Visa and the international payments system SWIFT were both monitored.


A surveillance branch known as "Follow the Money Eddie Jackson Youth Jersey ," focused on international financial transactions. The NSA claimed that by tracing international financial transfers it could expose terrorist networks. The agency set up a financial database called Tracfin to store information gathered from financial institutions. In 2011, the databank had 180 million entries, 84 percent of which related to credit cards and their users, who were mainly located in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.


Some information in the database came from SWIFT, which began secretly feeding the United States with details of financial transfers after the 911 attacks. When this partnership was exposed in 2006 Tarik Cohen Youth Jersey , the European Union asked the United States to ensure the security of bank data and respect the privacy of European citizens. After several rounds of talks, the European Union and the United States reached a deal in 2010 that allowed the latter to monitor European bank transfers to combat terrorism, with the precondition that the use and storage of this financial information was consistent with European data protection laws. But Snowden's latest revelations show that the United States never stopped monitoring SWIFT transfers, meaning that the entire negotiation process between the United States and the European Union was just for show.


On December 29, 2013, Der Spiegel claimed the NSA had broken almost all the security architectures designed by major companies Adam Shaheen Youth Jersey , including those of Cisco, Huawei, Juniper and Dell.


Other media reports have revealed that the United States hacked the computer network of Brazilian oil company, Petrobras.


II. America sets China as the main target of its secret surveillance


Evidence provided by Snowden shows that China is one of the major targets of America's illegal spying operations. The United States has eavesdropped on Chinese state leaders, scientific i. Wholesale Jerseys From China Wholesale Jerseys From China Wholesale NFL Jerseys Wholesale Jerseys Free Shipping Cheap Hoodie Wholesale Authentic Soccer Jerseys Wholesale NHL Hockey Jerseys Wholesale Football Jerseys Free Shipping Wholesale NCAA College Jerseys Cheap NBA Basketball Jerseys