Chinese provocations will not win Taiwanese hearts, but will only bring people around the world that cherish democracy closer, White House National Security Adviser John Bolton said in a tweet yesterday.
“Chinese military provocations won’t win any hearts or minds in Taiwan, but they will strengthen the resolve of people everywhere who value democracy. The Taiwan Relations Act [TRA] and our commitment are clear,” Bolton wrote.
Bolton did not elaborate on the US’ commitment to Taiwan.
Photo: Bloomberg
According to the TRA, which serves as the basis of unofficial relations between Taiwan and the US, Washington is obliged to provide Taiwan with defensive weapons.
It must also “maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system, of Taiwan’s people,” the act says.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) thanked Bolton for his “unwavering friendship and support” in a tweet.
“We’re determined to deal with any reckless military adventure by the bully across the #Taiwan Strait. Provocation only makes us stronger & as you said: ‘Surrender is not an option,’” Wu wrote.
Bolton’s comments came after two Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force fighter jets crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait on Sunday, a rare move that breached a long-held tacit agreement between the two sides.
Military sources said it was the first time since 1999 that the Chinese military had intentionally crossed the median line that separates Taiwan and China.
Commenting on the incident, Pentagon spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Dave Eastburn said the US opposes unilateral actions by any party aimed at altering the cross-strait “status quo,” including “any resort to force or other forms of coercion.”
“Consistent with the Taiwan Relations Act, the United States considers any effort to determine the future of Taiwan by other than peaceful means, including by boycotts or embargoes, of grave concern to the United States,” he said.
The Ministry of National Defense said that the air force scambled five fighter jets to intercept two Chinese J-11 fighter planes that crossed the median line and entered Taiwan’s southwestern airspace at 11am on Sunday.
The J-11 aircraft eventually returned to the Chinese side of the median line after receiving multiple radio warnings.
Ian Easton, a research fellow with the US-based think tank Project 2049 Institute, said the provocation was “further evidence that [Chinese President] Xi Jinping (習近平) is an aggressive and ambitious militarist.”
He said it was a good sign that Washington is beginning to realize Beijing’s threat to Taiwan and to the whole Indo-Pacific region.
The nation’s fastest supercomputer, Nano 4 (晶創26), is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, and would be used to train large language models in finance and national defense sectors, the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) said. The supercomputer, which would operate at about 86.05 petaflops, is being tested at a new cloud computing center in the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The exterior of the server cabinet features chip circuitry patterns overlaid with a map of Taiwan, highlighting the nation’s central position in the semiconductor industry. The center also houses Taiwania 2, Taiwania 3, Forerunner 1 and
FIRST TRIAL: Ko’s lawyers sought reduced bail and other concessions, as did other defendants, but the bail judge denied their requests, citing the severity of the sentences Former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) was yesterday sentenced to 17 years in prison and had his civil rights suspended for six years over corruption, embezzlement and other charges. Taipei prosecutors in December last year asked the Taipei District Court for a combined 28-year, six-month sentence for the four cases against Ko, who founded the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The cases were linked to the Core Pacific City (京華城購物中心) redevelopment project and the mismanagement of political donations. Other defendants convicted on separate charges included Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Angela Ying (應曉薇), who was handed a 15-year, six-month sentence; Core Pacific
J-6 REMODEL: The converted drones are part of Beijing’s expanding mix of airpower weapons, including bombers with stand-off missiles and UAV swarms, the report said China has stationed obsolete supersonic fighters converted to attack drones at six air bases close to the Taiwan Strait, a report published this month by the Arlington, Virginia-based Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies said. Satellite imagery of the airfields from the institute’s “China Airpower Tracker” shows what appear to be lines of stubby, swept-winged aircraft matching the shape of J-6 fighters that first flew with the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Air Force in the 1960s. Since their conversion to drones, the aircraft have been identified at five bases in China’s Fujian Province and one in Guangdong Province, the report said. J.
China used fake LinkedIn profiles to harvest sensitive data from NATO and EU institutions by soliciting information from staff, a European security source said on Friday. The operation, allegedly orchestrated by the Chinese Ministry of State Security, targeted dozens of employees at the military alliance or EU organizations through fictitious accounts, the source said, confirming reports in French and Belgian media. Posing as recruiters on the online professional networking platform, Chinese spies would initially request paid reports before later soliciting non-public or even classified information. One particularly active fake profile used the name “Kevin Zhang,” claiming to be the head
RSS