Headlines
A new case of the COVID-19 coronavirus disease was reported in Taiwan on Friday, marking a second day imported infections have been confirmed this week.
Two military officers and one soldier are in critical condition and a female sergeant is recovering at Kaohsiung Armed Forces General Hospital’s Zuoying branch after their small boat capsized in waters off Kaohsiung during a Navy landing drill Friday morning.
The Navy has found the body of an unidentified man drifting off the coast of Taitung County Thursday wearing a chain with an effigy of the Hindu monkey god Hanuman.
Officials estimated that the body had spent several days in the ocean and that it might have drifted up from the Philippines north to the area off the Hengchun Peninsula and further to Changbin, though it was also possible that the man fell into the water closer to Taiwan and was carried north by the Kuroshio Current or black tide.
The son of Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘), the convener of the ruling party’s legislative caucus was released on bail after questioning about a marijuana parcel from the United States which bore his name.
Taiwan will adopt an International Labor Organization (ILO) standard next year that requires sleeping areas for migrant workers to provide at least 3.6 square meters of floor space per person, the Ministry of Labor (MOL) said.
Chen Chu visit to legislature is called off
The Legislative Yuan at the last minute yesterday canceled a scheduled visit by Chen Chu (陳菊), who has been nominated as Control Yuan president, and other nominees to visit lawmakers, citing “intelligence” it received and other arrangement issues.
They did not elaborate on what the “intelligence” entailed.
A group of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers led by KMT caucus whip Lin Wei-chou (林為洲) had assembled at an entrance, apparently seeking to block Chen’s access to the building.
Local news reports stated that Taiwan Statebuilding Party legislator Chen Po-wei, aka 3Q, accused the KMT of mobilizing “black shirts” to storm the legislature.
The KMT responded “your brain or your eyes have a problem, quickly go see a doctor.”
ARC holders now treated like normal people
Foreign residents of Taiwan will no longer have to provide negative COVID-19 nucleic acid test results when entering the country starting Saturday, the Central Epidemic Command Center said Friday.
Foreign residents with residency permits are not restricted from entering Taiwan, and because Taiwanese do not have to show a negative COVID-19 test when re-entering the country, foreign residents should not have to either, the CECC said in reversing a previous decision.
Foreign Minister Joseph Wu was personally involved in trying to resolve this issue, which is very much to his credit.
In many, if not most countries, resident permit holders have most of the rights of citizens, minus a few privileges like voting.
Taiwan in theory is supposed to be like this, but in practise often discriminates against residents.
Examples include barring some–but not all–residency holders from the current government stimulus program, and issuing ID numbers that are incompatible with local ID numbers, effectively barring us from receiving many services.
In related news, the UK has included Taiwan on their “safe list” of countries their citizens can visit without needing to quarantine when they return.
The United States is not on the list.
However, so far it only applies to England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are still considering if they’ll accept the list.
Taiwan Defense Act reaches US House
A draft of the Taiwan Defense Act (TDA) was submitted to the U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday.
A previous draft was submitted to the Senate in June.
Once both are passed, it will go to President Trump for signing.
The proposed act would require the Department of Defense to take steps to ensure Taiwan’s ability to thwart a Chinese invasion and specifically a “fait accompli” against Taiwan.
Report out that Taiwan could build military base in Somaliland
The Taiwan News has come out with a report that includes the following:
“The French-language news site HCH24 on Thursday (July 2) wrote that the new bilateral relations between Taiwan and Somaliland have angered China because it is disrupting its campaign to isolate Taiwan.
The news site suggested that China is also suspicious of strengthening ties between Somaliland and Taiwan, as it would give its rival a foothold in a country that neighbors its sole overseas military base in Djibouti.
HCH24 then cited government officials in the capital city of Hargeisa as saying that the “second phase” of the treaty would permit the Taiwan military to conduct exercises in Somaliland.
In addition, the news site cited the sources as saying that Taiwan could “even work there to establish a military base in Berbera,” Somaliland’s key port city.
At this point it is important to be skeptical and remember this is one report, based entirely on another report with unnamed sources.
However, if it is true, it would be a surprising move.
A navy base would make some sense, as Taiwan is a major shipping nation and piracy does exist in the region.
Perhaps a military base, with helicopters, could provide some support.
And of course, they could spy on the Chinese base.
I’ll see if I can find more on this in the coming days.
Taiwan to re-open representative office in Guam
Taiwan said on Friday it will re-open its de facto consulate in Guam, a strategically-located U.S. island with a large U.S. military base.
Taiwan’s Foreign Ministry said the re-opening of its Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Guam, after its closure in 2017 for budget reasons, was a response to closer Taiwan-U.S. relations and the strategic importance of the Pacific region.
“Reestablishing TECO in Guam will facilitate economic and trade cooperation and exchanges between Taiwan and the greater western Pacific region, deepen Taiwan’s relations with its Pacific allies, and increase multilateral exchanges,” the ministry said.
Taiwan has full diplomatic relations with four nations in the region: Palau, Nauru, Tuvalu and the Marshall Islands.
China recently poached two countries, Kiribati and the Solomons.
Two Chinese reporters have been kicked out
Taiwan has revoked the credentials of two reporters from China’s Southeast Television station and ordered them to leave by Friday, amid an investigation into allegations that several Chinese media outlets have set up studios and produced political talk shows.
Interestingly they refer to “allegations”, the shows are on Youtube.
According the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC), it launched an investigation after local media reporters alleged that Chinese broadcasters, including China Central Television (CCTV), Southeast Television and Cross-Strait Television have established studios in Taipei and produced political talk shows which usually have a Chinese host serving as a moderator, followed by comments from two Taiwanese political pundits.
This is work beyond the scope of reporting they are allowed to do here, and in violation of relevant laws and regulations in Taiwan.
One of the reporters expelled, who is surnamed Ai (艾), told journalists at the airport Friday that they had followed the book when working in Taiwan and were unaware of what they did that violated the rules.
In a statement released by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office on Friday, it slammed the DPP for ordering the two reporters to leave.
“The DPP authorities’ unreasonable oppression of Chinese media outlets and their reporters’ normal news coverage exposed how fake they are about their so-called news freedom,” said in the statement.
Taiwan’s cultural ministry, meanwhile, said it was looking into the operations of other Chinese media outlets with journalists based in Taiwan.
CCP Propaganda porn
Speaking of Chinese propaganda, one of the things I do is follow some of their mouthpieces.
I’ve been keeping some articles in reserve with interesting or illuminating quotes for a day where I had a little bit of open time.
Today is finally that day.
In the wake of the Han recall, the Global Times ran a piece with the title “Beijing won’t rely on KMT for realizing reunification with Taiwan following ‘mayor’ recall drama: analysts.”
The article starts with this:
“Former Kuomintang (KMT) candidate for the 2020 Taiwan leadership election lost the unprecedented vote recalling him as “mayor” of Kaohsiung city, a southern port city of the Taiwan island as Taiwan’s pro-reunification political party lost again in its political struggle against the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DDP) with its anti-mainland and separatist stance.
The Chinese mainland public are not paying much attention to the incident as they have become convinced in recent years that they cannot rely on the KMT for Taiwan reunification as the party increasingly wavers on reunification and fails to contain separatism on the island, said the mainland analysts, adding that with a worsening economy and deteriorating cross-Straits ties, Taiwan’s tragic situation would continue, and only the strength of the mainland and the determination of whole Chinese nation could be relied on for realizing reunification.”
The article continues in that vein, repeating over and over again the refrain that the KMT is no longer reliable, then gets to this:
“When Chiang Chi-chen was elected chairman of the KMT in March, Xi Jinping, general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, did not send a congratulation letter to Chiang.
This was the first time since 2005 that the general secretary of the CPC Central Committee didn’t congratulate the elected KMT chairman.
The mainland experts said the reason could be the mainland has found the KMT growing more “localized and pro-US” instead of maintaining mutual trust with the Chinese mainland to promote cross-Straits exchanges and keep the region peaceful.”
Well, that will be true if Johnny Chiang succeeds in getting his reforms through in September.
It goes on:
“And Chinese mainland experts noted there were suspicious incidents indicating that the DPP was trying hard to cover its scandals in Kaohsiung by pushing the recall, including the death of the city council speaker.”
They lay out a conspiracy theory about the city council speaker killing himself over DPP scandals, ending that part of the article with:
“”Now in Taiwan, ‘democracy’ can even kill people,” Song said.
Li said if there was anything that the people from the mainland can take from the incident, that would be they were more certain that Taiwan’s practice of a Western multi-party system democracy has failed and this was the tragedy of the island, as always.
Song told the Global Times Sunday that “the only way out for Taiwan to get rid of the tragedy is the reunification.”
Another piece in CGTN on the same subject had this:
“The removal of Han Kuo-yu is an important step taken by the DPP to beat the KMT in pursuit of long-term ruling.
It is also a calculated step taken by the separatists in Taiwan to go on a “witch hunt” of whoever acknowledges the “1992 Consensus.””
This isn’t the first time that they’ve said they don’t think the KMT is reliable any longer–there were a few comments to that effect in articles earlier this year.
What is different this time, however, is that that is the focus of the entire article.
It is clearly a shot across the bow at Johnny Chiang, and the KMT in general.
No doubt, some in the KMT–though by no means a majority–will find articles like this very concerning.
That bloc, mostly those with family, historical or business ties with China, will almost certainly vote against Chiang’s reforms.
They also emphasize that they don’t need the KMT in their goal of “reunification” as they call it, and repeated that message repeatedly with lines like this:
“the mainland didn’t attach too much importance to Han and the KMT and it would not impact reunification progress at all.”
The message appears to be to the KMT: you need us more than we need you.
Here is another passage in the article that underlines that:
“”In the past, KMT politicians only want to get benefits from the mainland by using the old key passphrase ‘1992 Consensus,’ and the mainland also would like to offer since we still got faith on the KMT, but since the KMT has failed to contain the separatism in past decade and refuse to negotiate the reunification with mainland, many people in the mainland have found the KMT is not as valuable as before,” said a Beijing-based anonymous expert on Taiwan affairs.”
One other thing I saw recently, but seem to have lost the link, was the use of the “rebel” in reference to Taiwan.
I’ve only seen that used the once, though.
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Image courtesy of the Embassy of The People’s Republic of China in the United States Facebook page
