Japan fired its navy chief yesterday and slapped dozens of defense officials with penalties over a series of scandals, while a report found the military negligent in a deadly crash between a destroyer and a fishing boat.
Japanese Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who faced pressure to resign following the collision, said he would take a two-month pay cut as part of disciplinary measures aimed at restoring public trust in his battered ministry.
Topping the list of ministry troubles has been a leak of sensitive missile data last year that led to a naval officer's indictment, and the collision last month between a destroyer and a tuna trawler that left two fishermen presumed dead.
"We promise to take preventive measures firmly and promptly," Ishiba told reporters, repeating his apologies for "impermissible" scandals and accidents.
Ishiba said he would set up an investigative panel to prevent future problems, but gave no details.
Maritime Self-Defense Forces chief Admiral Eiji Yoshikawa was dismissed over the destroyer collision. He is to be succeeded by Keiji Akahoshi, a former regional commander at Sasebo naval base in southern Japan.
Two vice defense ministers and 19 other navy executives are also taking pay cuts, returning part of their monthly salaries to government coffers for up to two months. Seventeen others were suspended from work for up to 40 days over the data leak. A total of 88 officials were punished.
The Defense Ministry also issued a report yesterday acknowledging negligence in the collision with the fishing boat, saying the destroyer failed to guard against smaller vessels and ignored its responsibility to give way.
A signaling system malfunction disrupted high-speed rail (HSR) services beginning at 8am today, with trains temporarily reduced to three northbound and three southbound trains per hour as authorities conduct inspections. The malfunction occurred on a section of track in Miaoli County during pre-operation checks early this morning, forcing northbound and southbound trains to use a single track, the HSR operator said. The regular schedule has been replaced with three hourly trains offering only nonreserved seating in each direction, stopping at every station, it said, adding that business class cars would still have reserved seating. Departures from terminal stations are scheduled at the top
Taiwan is still in the process of assessing the possibility of recruiting workers from Eswatini, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday, adding that its goal is to help Eswatini upgrade its vocational training centers. If there are plans to recruit workers from Eswatini, safeguarding national security, protecting public health and ensuring the employment rights of Taiwanese would be prerequisites, Department of West Asian and African Affairs Director-General Yen Chia-liang (顏嘉良) told a news conference. Key considerations would also include filling labor shortages in specific industries, and fostering bilateral professional and technical exchanges, he said. Yen was asked about the progress of labor
A US uncrewed surface vessel (USV) encountered multiple Chinese warships during an autonomous transit of the Taiwan Strait, US defense company Seasats said in a statement on Wednesday. Seasats announced that a Lightfish USV had completed the first autonomous transit of the Taiwan Strait. Over five days, the USV traversed the entire length of the Strait while constantly monitoring surface vessel traffic, the company said. The Lightfish encountered multiple Chinese warships, one of which was a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) Type 056 corvette, it said. The Chinese vessels were operating “well within Taiwan’s exclusive economic zone without transmitting their identity via the
VERBOSE VESSELS: A CGA cutter and a China Coast Guard exchanged verbal barbs for more than a day in Taiwanese-controlled waters before the Chinese vessel left The Taiwanese and Chinese coast guards had a standoff near the strategically located Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the north of the South China Sea, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The two sides engaged in intense radio exchanges over sovereignty claims during the 33-hour standoff. China Coast Guard vessel 3501 eventually left the restricted waters, 26.6 nautical miles (49.2km) west of the Pratas Islands, at 5pm yesterday, the CGA said. Lying approximately between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Taiwan-controlled Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance — more than
RSS