In view of the US and Japan's plan to revise their security pact to make the Taiwan Strait a mutual security concern, Vice President Annette Lu (
"[The plan] signified that Taiwan's existence, Taiwan's sovereignty and Taiwan's security are receiving attention from the international community," Lu said.
The vice president made the comments yesterday in response to media questions regarding a Washington Post report that the US and Japan would declare after a meeting in Washington, DC yesterday on bilateral security matters that Taiwan is a mutual security concern.
In a meeting yesterday, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura and Japanese Defense Agency chief Yoshinori Ono were expected to make strong statements about tension in the Taiwan Strait.
Approving of the moves, the vice president called on Taiwan's people to adopt a severe and vigilant attitude with regard to the cross-strait situation.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday welcomed the US and Japan's planned declaration to identify the Taiwan Strait as one of their "common strategic objectives."
"Taiwan, being a member of the Asian region, is more than willing to continue taking part in regional events and assist in safeguarding the region's peace and stability," MOFA spokesman Michel Lu (呂慶龍) said.
Hsiao Bi-khim (
Former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) said yesterday that expected revisions to the US-Japan Security Alliance will make a Chinese invasion of Taiwan difficult to achieve.
While giving a lecture to trainees at the Lee Teng-hui School, Lee said that Beijing has used military force to try to intimidate the Taiwanese people into voting for candidates it favored in the three presidential elections since 1996.
Disappointed at its failure to achieve the desired results, Beijing has given up hope on unification through peaceful means and is determined to achieve unification through military force, Lee said.
He said that China's plan to enact an "anti-secession law" has received negative responses from the US and Taiwan because Beijing's claim that Taiwan is part of China is totally unconvincing.
He urged Beijing to review its nationalist policy and to bring about peace in Asia.
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
Taiwan yesterday denied Chinese allegations that its military was behind a cyberattack on a technology company in Guangzhou, after city authorities issued warrants for 20 suspects. The Guangzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau earlier yesterday issued warrants for 20 people it identified as members of the Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command (ICEFCOM). The bureau alleged they were behind a May 20 cyberattack targeting the backend system of a self-service facility at the company. “ICEFCOM, under Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, directed the illegal attack,” the warrant says. The bureau placed a bounty of 10,000 yuan (US$1,392) on each of the 20 people named in
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
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