While the government has consented to China’s inauguration of a new commercial flight route near the middle of the Taiwan Strait starting tomorrow, opponents continued to rail against the plan yesterday, leading to the adjournment of a regular legislative session.
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) at about noon declared the question-and-answer session with Premier Mao Chi-kuo (毛治國) adjourned until Tuesday, following hours of fruitless talks among party caucuses on the demands made by the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU).
The TSU demanded that the implementation of the M503 route be put off until information regarding the negotiations about the route between Taiwan and China that took place earlier this month is deliberated and approved by the legislature, TSU Legislator Lai Cheng-chang (賴振昌) said.
Photo: Sam Yeh, AFP
Should China insist that it will start using the route, the government should indefinitely suspend any further negotiations with China because the move would be tantamount to infringement into Taiwan’s airspace, Lai said.
Cross-strait talks are scheduled to be held on Tuesday in Beijing, the 10th round of talks to conclude a trade in goods agreement.
The government recently gave its consent to the proposed route after Beijing agreed to revise its original plan, announced in January, by moving the route westward by 6 nautical miles (11km) and delaying the adoption of three feeder routes: W121, W122 and W123.
However, many in Taiwan remain concerned about the security risks, as the route still comes as close as 10.2 nautical miles to the median line of the Taiwan Strait.
In addition to the government saying it understands that the congestion of China’s A470 route warrants the opening of a new route, National Security Bureau Director-General Lee Shying-jow (李翔宙) on Thursday said that the implementation of the M503 route would force China’s military jets to patrol farther from Taiwan and thus give Taiwan more leeway on defense.
Lee’s argument and that of Chinese Ministry of National Defense official Geng Yansheng (耿雁生), who on Thursday described the route as an “air passage of peace,” suggested that Beijing did not designate the M503 unilaterally, but in collusion with President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration, Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Huang Wei-cher (黃偉哲) said yesterday.
When TSU lawmakers occupied the podium to boycott the session, dozens of activists broke into the legislative compound in a surprise protest against the government’s handling of the issue, but they were stopped outside the building as security guards quickly pulled down a steel door.
The protesters shouted: “Abolish M503” and other slogans denouncing the government’s concessions as a “forfeiture of the nation’s sovereignty.”
They were forcibly removed from the legislative complex by police.
Activists staged a similar protest on Thursday at the offices of the Mainland Affairs Council.
PREPAREDNESS: Given the difficulty of importing ammunition during wartime, the Ministry of National Defense said it would prioritize ‘coproduction’ partnerships A newly formed unit of the Marine Corps tasked with land-based security operations has recently replaced its aging, domestically produced rifles with more advanced, US-made M4A1 rifles, a source said yesterday. The unnamed source familiar with the matter said the First Security Battalion of the Marine Corps’ Air Defense and Base Guard Group has replaced its older T65K2 rifles, which have been in service since the late 1980s, with the newly received M4A1s. The source did not say exactly when the upgrade took place or how many M4A1s were issued to the battalion. The confirmation came after Chinese-language media reported
The Taiwanese passport ranked 33rd in a global listing of passports by convenience this month, rising three places from last month’s ranking, but matching its position in January last year. The Henley Passport Index, an international ranking of passports by the number of designations its holder can travel to without a visa, showed that the Taiwan passport enables holders to travel to 139 countries and territories without a visa. Singapore’s passport was ranked the most powerful with visa-free access to 192 destinations out of 227, according to the index published on Tuesday by UK-based migration investment consultancy firm Henley and Partners. Japan’s and
A Ministry of Foreign Affairs official yesterday said that a delegation that visited China for an APEC meeting did not receive any kind of treatment that downgraded Taiwan’s sovereignty. Department of International Organizations Director-General Jonathan Sun (孫儉元) said that he and a group of ministry officials visited Shenzhen, China, to attend the APEC Informal Senior Officials’ Meeting last month. The trip went “smoothly and safely” for all Taiwanese delegates, as the Chinese side arranged the trip in accordance with long-standing practices, Sun said at the ministry’s weekly briefing. The Taiwanese group did not encounter any political suppression, he said. Sun made the remarks when
BROAD AGREEMENT: The two are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff to 15% and a commitment for TSMC to build five more fabs, a ‘New York Times’ report said Taiwan and the US have reached a broad consensus on a trade deal, the Executive Yuan’s Office of Trade Negotiations said yesterday, after a report said that Washington is set to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent. The New York Times on Monday reported that the two nations are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent and commit Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to building at least five more facilities in the US. “The agreement, which has been under negotiation for months, is being legally scrubbed and could be announced this month,” the paper said,
RSS