President Chen Shui-bian (
In his capacity as commander-in-chief, Chen visited Air Force Operations Command in the company of Minister of National Defense Lee Jye (
Chen listened to briefings on joint operations of the Air Force and offered special bonus money to Air Force personnel as a token of his appreciation for their services during the holiday.
PHOTO: SAM YEH, AFP
The president then made a whirlwind tour of military bases around the northern military area of Linko (
Chen was welcomed by commanders and representatives of various military units stationed in Linko.
Chen expressed his admiration for the high morale shown by all the troops in the units and their contributions to national defense.
Neutrality
Lee, while addressing a ceremony at the Ministry of National Defense on Thursday in celebration of the upcoming Double Ten National Day, again reminded all military personnel, regardless of their rank, position and pay level, to stay out of politics in accordance with constitutional provisions.
The appeal came amid turmoil arising from an anti-corruption campaign aimed at pressuring Chen to resign.
Sporadic clashes between Chen's opponents and supporters have been reported at street rallies in some southern cities. The presence of a handful of those in military uniform at anti-Chen rallies has drawn criticism.
Noting that members of the armed forces are required by the Constitution to avoid personal, regional and partisan affiliation, and to be loyal to the country and protect the people, Lee said every service member should refrain from taking part in political activities.
"All men and women in uniform should dedicate themselves to serving the country and the people and transcend partisan affiliations while working to uplift military professionalism and hone their combat skills," he said.
IDF fighter
In related news, the ministry declined to comment on a media report that progress has been made on a mid-life upgrade project for the locally developed Ching-kuo indigenous defense fighters (IDF).
According to a report in the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times' sister paper) on Thursday, an upgraded version of the IDF fighter with in-flight refueling capability has undergone test flights.
Ministry spokesman Wu Chi-fang (吳季方) said the IDF mid-life upgrade program, code-named "Project Shiang Sheng," is classified.
"The project is still ongoing and the ministry is not in a position to elaborate on its implementation," Wu said.
Military sources said that the military-run Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology guided the upgrade and commissioned the state-owned Aerospace Industrial Development Corp to undertake the project.
The primary objective of the project is to improve the strike capability of the IDF, turning it into a "joint countermeasures platform" as a part of the new strategy to "conduct decisive battles outside the territory," the sources said.
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,
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read: