The purpose of China's efforts in aligning with the member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is to isolate Taiwan and drive it away from the US and countries in Southeast Asia, US experts said Friday.
Speaking at a hearing called by the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission under the US Congress, Bronson Percival, a senior researcher at the Center for Naval Analysis, said that China is pressuring Southeast Asian countries to isolate Taiwan and that those countries are not willing to be dragged into a conflict by the US over the cross-strait impasse.
China now is increasingly emerging as the most unstable factor in East Asia due to its likelihood of attacking Taiwan, Percival said.
Dan Blumenthal, a former director for China, Taiwan and Mongolia affairs at the US Department of Defense, said that China is attempting to cement its influence in Southeast Asia and alienate the countries in the region from the US through the signing of a free trade agreement with the ASEAN member nations.
According to Blumenthal, who cited a recent annual report by the Pentagon on China's military power and strategy, China is aiming to increase its clout in Southeast Asia and adjacent sea areas through its military buildup that focuses on deploying more ballistic missiles, aircraft and destroyers.
Blumenthal suggested that Washington strengthen its ties with Australia, India, Vietnam and Japan as a counterweight to China's expansion in the region.
Another participant claimed that China's intention, rather than its military buildup and modernization, is the major concern to its neighboring countries, such as Japan, and to the US.
China's military expansion is aimed at increasing its influence in Asia, in particular toward Taiwan and the US military deployment in the Far East, he said, warning that future uncertainties will loom large in the region along with China's growing military might.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
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