A second day of live-fire drills conducted by the Coast Guard Administration on one of the disputed Spratly Islands (Nansha Islands, 南沙群島) drew condemnation from Vietnam, which also claims the South China Sea chain as its territory.
The drills are conducted annually on the Taiwan-administered Itu Aba Island (Taiping Island, 太平島), said Shih Yi-che (施義哲), the administration’s head of communications.
In 2008, Taiwan built a 1,150m-long airstrip on the islet, which is known as Ba Binh in Vietnam and is also claimed by China. Aside from these three competing claims, all or parts of the Spratlys are also contested by Malaysia, Brunei and the Philippines.
The Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Monday said the drills violate Vietnam’s sovereignty, threaten maritime security and add to tensions in the area.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Anna Kao (高安) did not immediately return two calls to her office, while Shih said he was not aware of the complaint.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chiu Chih-wei (邱志偉) said by telephone yesterday that Taiwan must strengthen its military presence on Taiping, given China’s land reclamation in the Spratlys.
Beijing has been carrying out land reclamation projects in both the Spratlys and Paracels (Xisha Islands, 西沙群島) — which Taiwan claims — as it seeks to extend the reach of its military in one of the world’s busiest waterways.
A legislative committee last week commissioned a study on the possibility of stationing warships on Taiping, while the government has earmarked NT$3.3 billion (US$110.24 million) to build a new wharf there.
China has been more aggressively asserting its territorial claims to more than 90 percent of the waterway, disregarding the multiple claims of sovereignty.
It completed an upgraded airstrip in the Paracel Islands last month, prompting a similar complaint from Vietnam.
Hanoi was also angered earlier this year when Beijing moved an oil rig into waters off its coast, prompting weeks of skirmishes between vessels from both sides and leading to deadly anti-China riots in Vietnam in May. China removed the rig in July.
Taiwanese firms were also affected by the riots, apparently because rioters mistakenly thought they were Chinese-owned.
Taiwan is the fourth-largest foreign investor in Vietnam. Last year, Vietnam had a US$7.2 billion trade deficit with Taiwan, according to Hanoi government data.
Taiwanese investment in the country reached US$723.4 million in the year through last month.
Additional reporting by staff writer
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday inaugurated the Danjiang Bridge across the Tamsui River in New Taipei City, saying that the structure would be an architectural icon and traffic artery for Taiwan. Feted as a major engineering achievement, the Danjiang Bridge is 920m long, 211m tall at the top of its pylon, and is the longest single-pylon asymmetric cable-stayed bridge in the world, the government’s Web site for the structure said. It was designed by late Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid. The structure, with a maximum deck of 70m, accommodates road and light rail traffic, and affords a 200m navigation channel for boats,
PRECISION STRIKES: The most significant reason to deploy HIMARS to outlying islands is to establish a ‘dead zone’ that the PLA would not dare enter, a source said A High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) would be deployed to Penghu County and Dongyin Island (東引) in Lienchiang County (Matsu) to force the Chinese military to retreat at least 100km from the coastline, a military source said yesterday. Taiwan has been procuring HIMARS and Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) from the US in batches. Once all batches have been delivered, Taiwan would possess 111 HIMARS units and 504 ATACMS, which have a range of 300km. Considering that “offense is the best defense,” the military plans to forward-deploy the systems to outlying islands such as Penghu and Dongyin so that
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest foundry service provider, yesterday said that global semiconductor revenue is projected to hit US$1.5 trillion in 2030, after the figure exceeds US$1 trillion this year, as artificial intelligence (AI) demand boosts consumption of token and compute power. “We are still at the beginning of the AI revolution, but we already see a significant impact across the whole semiconductor ecosystem,” TSMC deputy cochief operating officer Kevin Zhang (張曉強) said at the company’s annual technology symposium in Hsinchu City. “It is fair to say that in the past decade, smartphones and other mobile devices were
‘CLEAR MESSAGE’: The bill would set up an interagency ‘tiger team’ to review sanctions tools and other economic options to help deter any Chinese aggression toward Taiwan US Representative Young Kim has introduced a bill to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, calling for an interagency “tiger team” to preplan coordinated sanctions and economic measures in response to possible Chinese military or political action against Taiwan. “[Chinese President] Xi Jinping [習近平] has directed the People’s Liberation Army to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. China has a plan. America should have one too,” Kim said in a news release on Thursday last week. She introduced the “Deter PRC [People’s Republic of China] aggression against Taiwan act” to “ensure the US has a coordinated sanctions strategy ready should
RSS