Recent and upcoming trips by legislators to review military facilities overseas have stirred up controversy over suspicions that the Ministry of National Defense may be helping to pay for the trips. Furthermore, some legislators prohibited from leaving the country because of personal legal woes have used their official status to obtain travel exemptions. Implicated legislators in both camps have denied wrongdoing, but the exposure should raise questions about the quality of the legislative envoys the nation is sending abroad.

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By Huang Tien-lin 黃天麟
Economic issues will become the next political battleground for Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) in next year's presidential election. His strategy consists of using economic topics to deflect national focus from the KMT's weakness on the question of national identity.

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By Orville Schell
The Western media have a habit of going on feeding frenzies. Ironically, when it comes to China, the latest frenzy concerns food itself.

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By Chien Hsi-chieh 簡錫土皆
Peaceful independence may sound like a utopian dream, but it is the only way for the nation to achieve de jure independence. But it is a plan that will require much wisdom and a solid strategy.

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A voice in the wilderness is forcing China to heed growing international concers over the environment
By Jonathan Watts
He is not as well known as former US vice president Al Gore, but among green campaigners, no one has a bigger role in tackling climate change than Ma Jun (馬軍). As China's economic growth races on at breakneck speed and with more dirty, coal-burning power plants coming on line each year, the world's most populous nation will soon overtake the US as the biggest greenhouse gas emitter.

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