Taiwan accused China yesterday of exploiting its misfortune in trying to assert sovereignty over the island and accused Beijing of slowing international aid efforts by political meddling.
"Their words and deeds violate international humanitarian principles ... and will be condemned and regarded with shame and regret by the international community," Foreign Minister Jason Hu said, referring to Beijing.
Taipei has thanked Beijing for its offers of aid, but has chafed at reports that it was expecting foreign countries to seek its blessing when dispatching emergency relief on the grounds that Taiwan was a province under Chinese sovereignty.
"In many cases this delayed foreign rescuers in carrying out their relief work in Taiwan," Hu said.
Taiwan's Red Cross urged international donors to contact Taipei directly -- not Beijing -- if they wanted to help.
Mainland Affairs Council deputy chairman Sheu Ke-sheng said China was "making political gestures at the expense of one country's disaster" and added: "This is extremely inappropriate."
Meanwhile, political commentators here said that while China is trying hard to "politicize" international humanitarian aid to Taiwan in the aftermath of earthquake, Taipei should seize the opportunity to help transform cross-strait relations.
Following the killer quake early Tuesday morning, Chinese President Jiang Zemin (
However, China's goodwill gesture was replaced by a series of attempts to push its "one-China policy" among the international community during the past few days.
First came China's political meddling at the UN, which had delayed sending a relief mission to Taiwan while waiting for "permission" from China.
The UN's Office of Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Geneva reportedly decided to send a six-member team to help with relief efforts only after close consultation with China.
To make matters worse, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan sent his sympathies to the people of the "Taiwan province of China."
China's Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan (唐家璇) also took advantage of an opportunity during a UN meeting on Sept. 22 to promote its position that Taiwan is a part of China by expressing gratitude for international humanitarian aid "on behalf of the Taiwan people."
In addition, China's Red Cross chapter asked other international chapters to "consult" with it before they decided to offer help to quake-stricken Taiwan, and a Russian earthquake relief mission en route to Taiwan was forced to make a lengthy detour over Siberia because China refused to allow the Russian plane carrying the team to pass through its airspace.
In response to China's actions, Foreign Minister Jason Hu (
"Their behavior has violated international humanitarian principles," Hu said. "Such actions won't be accepted by the people of Taiwan, and they will be condemned by members of the international community."
Hu also criticized the way Annan worded his letter and said he filed a letter of protest with the UN.
Although some members of the international press, legislators and students have also protested against China's recent statements and actions, observers acknowledge that criticism is unlikely to come from official authorities of foreign countries.
"There is no question which issues are more important, humanitarian or political considerations. But yet don't expect any strong attacks from any official authorities, which have chosen to stick to the `one-China' policy," David Chou (
Although the Straits Exchange Foundation politely rebuffed China's offer to send medical teams to help relief efforts here, Taiwan is prepared to accept China's offer of US$100,000, sources said.
In view of the government's prudence in accepting aid from China, political commentators said yesterday that a friendly response from Taiwan might help transform its image as a troublemaker on cross-strait issues.
EUROPEAN TARGETS: The planned Munich center would support TSMC’s European customers to design high-performance, energy-efficient chips, an executive said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said that it plans to launch a new research-and-development (R&D) center in Munich, Germany, next quarter to assist customers with chip design. TSMC Europe president Paul de Bot made the announcement during a technology symposium in Amsterdam on Tuesday, the chipmaker said. The new Munich center would be the firm’s first chip designing center in Europe, it said. The chipmaker has set up a major R&D center at its base of operations in Hsinchu and plans to create a new one in the US to provide services for major US customers,
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday said that it would redesign the written portion of the driver’s license exam to make it more rigorous. “We hope that the exam can assess drivers’ understanding of traffic rules, particularly those who take the driver’s license test for the first time. In the past, drivers only needed to cram a book of test questions to pass the written exam,” Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) told a news conference at the Taoyuan Motor Vehicle Office. “In the future, they would not be able to pass the test unless they study traffic regulations
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying
‘COMING MENACINGLY’: The CDC advised wearing a mask when visiting hospitals or long-term care centers, on public transportation and in crowded indoor venues Hospital visits for COVID-19 last week increased by 113 percent to 41,402, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, as it encouraged people to wear a mask in three public settings to prevent infection. CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said weekly hospital visits for COVID-19 have been increasing for seven consecutive weeks, and 102 severe COVID-19 cases and 19 deaths were confirmed last week, both the highest weekly numbers this year. CDC physician Lee Tsung-han (李宗翰) said the youngest person hospitalized due to the disease this year was reported last week, a one-month-old baby, who does not