A KMT lawmaker criticized the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) yesterday for allowing Mandarin Airlines, a China Airlines (CAL,
Legislator Chi Kuo-tung (
"Is this arrangement fair?" Chi asked, referring to China Airlines' poor flight safety record. "Nobody in the government has assumed responsibility for the latest CAL crash which claimed 225 lives, and now the CAA has even allowed the carrier's subsidiary to fly the `golden route.' How can the CAA justify its decision?"
A China Airlines Boeing 747-200 jetliner crashed into the Taiwan Strait near Penghu en route to Hong Kong May 25, killing all 225 passengers and crew aboard. It was the fourth major fatal mishap involving one of the airline's planes in eight years.
"For an air carrier with such a poor safety record, CAL has not been punished by the CAA and has instead been rewarded by having its offshoot receive the hotly-contested rights to the Taiwan-Hong Kong route," Chi lamented, adding that CAA Director-General Chang Kuo-cheng (
Several representatives of the bereaved victims' families of the May 25 CAL crash were present at the news conference and backed Chi's call for Chang's resignation, over what they said was an unfair "Taiwan-Hong Kong aviation rights allocation."
Taiwan and Hong Kong signed a new five-year aviation agreement in Taipei on June 29 under which Mandarin Airlines and Hong Kong's Air Hong Kong, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cathay Pacific Airways, will join Taiwan-Hong Kong flight services for the first time.
The new accord allows EVA Airways to add 33 passenger flights per week, while Mandarin Airlines will obtain 16 new passenger flights. These 16 flights had been slated for China Airlines before the May 25 crash. According to international aviation regulations, carriers involved in fatal flight accidents cannot obtain new flights within a year. As a result, China Airlines will continue to operate 100 passenger flights, while the number of EVA's weekly flights will increase from the current 21 to 54.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
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