The end of Pope Francis’ papacy presents not just a ceremonial moment for the Catholic Church, but a pivotal opportunity for communities that have long valued the church’s moral voice in global affairs. Among them is Taiwan, whose enduring relationship with the Holy See has carried profound symbolic
Within Taiwan’s education system exists a long-standing and deep-rooted culture of falsification. In the past month, a large number of “ghost signatures” — signatures using the names of deceased people — appeared on recall petitions submitted by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) against Democratic
Abolish Chinese charactersA few months ago, under the overhang walkway (teng-a-kha, or Hokkien architecture) of a Tainan side street, I saw a child — perhaps 10 years old — hunched over one of the collapsable tables of her parents’ food stall, writing columns of “hanzi” (漢字, Chinese/Han characters),
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I observe international affairs from Washington, capital of a superpower which used to be the world’s more-or-less benevolent hegemon, but which is now groping for a different role as a potential imperialist carving up the planet into spheres of influence.What if you are looking back at us in Washin
There are few places where inflation is felt as profoundly these days as tariff rates.A few months ago, US President Donald Trump’s election campaign promise of a 10 percent levy on all US imports seemed shocking. Now we are looking at a 46 percent rate on Vietnam and 145 percent on China.This week,
The successful collaboration between the health ministries of Malaysia and Thailand, industry partners in Egypt and Malaysia, and the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi) to bring a new hepatitis C antiviral drug — ravidasvir — to market in 2022 was an important milestone. For years, a 12-
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei chapter director Huang Lu Chin-ju (黃呂錦茹) on Friday last week was detained and held incommunicado for allegedly agreeing to or instructing the use of forged signatures to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators. The KMT, supported by the Taiwan Peo
There is much evidence that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is sending soldiers from the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — and is learning lessons for a future war against Taiwan.Until now, the CCP has claimed that they have not sent PLA personnel to support
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), joined by the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), held a protest on Saturday on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei. They were essentially standing for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which is anxious about the mass recall campaign against KMT legislators.President William
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The treaty parceling out the waters of the Indus River and its five great tributaries between India and Pakistan was signed 65 years ago. Three eastern rivers, and about 30 per cent of the total water, were assigned to India, and the others to Pakistan. It has long been celebrated as the most enduri
My cousin Ziyad was too young to die. He was sleeping at home in Khan Yunis refugee camp when the bombs fell just before midnight on April 18. After they heard the explosion, my cousins Mohammed and Moatsem ran to save him, but he had already died in his bed, they said. He was 44.Ziyad was a social
The government is open to discussions about absentee voting in national elections and referendums, but not voting from overseas, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) told a plenary session at the legislature in Taipei on Tuesday. Cho expressed concern that allowing voting from overseas would expose elections
Pope Francis devoted himself to reform in the Catholic Church over the past 12 years, although he differed from his two more overtly anti-communist predecessors. He believed that we should build bridges instead of high walls and that lack of communication leads to misunderstandings. With this mindse
Over the past decade, artificial intelligence (AI) and critical mineral technologies have redefined global geopolitics and geoeconomics. While these advances offer transformative opportunities, they also bring about significant strategic vulnerabilities.The Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) — c
The photograph looks old at first. Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Deputy Chairman Sean Lien (連勝文) sits next to China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) Director Song Tao (宋濤). There is a sense of familiarity and warmth within the shot, but it also carries an indescribable chill. Some people opened the l
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In any conflict, you have to recruit allies. Unfortunately for US President Donald Trump, that is also true of his trade war. Some of his advisers understand this: US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent intends to use the “90-day pause” he won from the president to round up old friends and encir
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