■ Travel
UK issues advisory
The UK joined the list of nations advising its citizens against travel to Taipei yesterday in response to a World Health Organization (WHO) travel advisory. "The Chief Medical Officer at the Department of Health -- on the basis of information from the WHO -- has strongly advised the British public to defer travel to Taipei in Taiwan for the time being due to the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome [SARS]," the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office Web site states. The British Trade and Cultural Office (BTCO) informed British citizens resident in Taiwan of the advisory in an e-mail yesterday but urged them not to panic. "This does not mean that we advise you to leave Taipei," Alan Dillon, BTCO spokesman said in the e-mail.
■ WHO
China still says no
China opposes the participation of Taiwan in the WHO, even as an observer, China's official Xinhua news agency reported. It quoted Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue (章啟月) as saying a request from the Marshall Islands that Taiwan attend a WHO meeting had no legal basis and violated the organisation's principles. "The Chinese government firmly opposes such a move," Xinhua quoted her as saying in a report issued late on Thursday. "Taiwan, a province of China, is not eligible to participate in the WHO or attend the WHO conference as an observer," Xinhua quoted Zhang as saying. "China opposes any political maneuvers made in the name of health issues."
■ Phillipines
No visa for workers
Taiwan has temporarily suspended the issuing of visas to workers from the Philippines due to severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) considerations, sources from the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) said. Taiwan authorities will impose the restriction for three days, starting yeserday, as the Philippines has been listed by the WHO as one of the many SARS-affected areas around the world, CLA officials said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will review and decide on May 12 whether the suspension on the issuing of visas to people from WHO-listed SARS-affected areas will be lifted or continued, the CLA officials said. Some 550 Philippine nationals are expected to be affected by the measure over the following few days, the officials estimated.
■ Diplomacy
Groups protest `China' label
Seven Taiwanese-American groups sent a joint letter to US President George W. Bush Thursday protesting the designation of Taiwan used in an annual world human rights report released by the US Department of State at the end of March. In its "Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2002, " Taiwan was referred to as "China (Taiwan only) " while the People's Republic of China was designated as "China (including Tibet, Hong Kong and Macau)." The Taiwanese groups said in their letter that they were very much surprised by what they said was the "inappropriate and misleading" designation of Taiwan. Quoting President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), the letter said that Taiwan is a sovereign state and not part of any other country. Nor is a local government or a province of any other country, it added. The letter continued that Taiwan is neither Hong Kong nor Macau and that the State Department's description of Taiwan is confusing and misleading.
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) mention of Taiwan’s official name during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Wednesday was likely a deliberate political play, academics said. “As I see it, it was intentional,” National Chengchi University Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies professor Wang Hsin-hsien (王信賢) said of Ma’s initial use of the “Republic of China” (ROC) to refer to the wider concept of “the Chinese nation.” Ma quickly corrected himself, and his office later described his use of the two similar-sounding yet politically distinct terms as “purely a gaffe.” Given Ma was reading from a script, the supposed slipup
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
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
The bodies of two individuals were recovered and three additional bodies were discovered on the Shakadang Trail (砂卡礑) in Taroko National Park, eight days after the devastating earthquake in Hualien County, search-and-rescue personnel said. The rescuers reported that they retrieved the bodies of a man and a girl, suspected to be the father and daughter from the Yu (游) family, 500m from the entrance of the trail on Wednesday. The rescue team added that despite the discovery of the two bodies on Friday last week, they had been unable to retrieve them until Wednesday due to the heavy equipment needed to lift