Chief of the General Staff Huo Shou-yeh (
Huo, who arrived in New York on July 13, visited Washington last Saturday through Monday. Huo toured the US Army Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia, on Wednesday before heading on Thursday to Hawaii to visit US Pacific Command. Hou was scheduled to wrap up his visit yesterday, the sources said.
While visiting Washington, the sources said that Huo held talks with US Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Peter Pace and Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Christopher Hill to exchange views on regional security issues.
Expressing hope at the talks that Taiwan and the US will increase military exchanges, Huo urged the administration of President George W. Bush to relax restrictions on visits to Taiwan by high-level US military officers, the sources said.
Huo proposed that Washington allow Taiwan to take part in US military exercises and asked that the US assist Taiwan with military improvements by helping Taipei beef up its joint warfare capabilities, the sources said.
The US officials expressed satisfaction that Taiwan's legislature had finally approved part of the budget for a long-stalled arms procurement package from the US.
Huo also reiterated Taiwan's desire to procure F-16 C/D fighter jets from the US and urged the Bush administration to issue a letter of offer and acceptance for the procurement as soon as possible, sources said.
While approving the budget for the current fiscal year, the Legislative Yuan froze one-third of the NT$16 billion (US$486 million) in funds earmarked for the F-16 C/D purchase plan. The freeze will be lifted if the Ministry of National Defense obtains US consent for the procurement by the end of October.
The budget also allocated NT$200 million in funding for research on the feasibility of purchasing diesel-electric submarines from the US; NT$6.1 billion for procuring submarine-hunting P3-C aircraft; and NT$3.5 billion in order to upgrade the performance of Patriot PAC-2 anti-missile batteries.
NATIONAL SECURITY: Authorities are working to confirm the identities of the military personnel involved and investigating possible illegal conduct and regulatory violations Authorities are probing possible national security implications after Kinmen police and immigration officers on Sunday found a Chinese woman allegedly posing as a tourist while engaging in prostitution involving more than 10 military personnel. The woman, surnamed Chen (陳), has since been deported, authorities said, adding that investigators are still working to confirm the identities of those implicated, as the records only listed code names and aliases. The case stemmed from a report received by the Kinmen District Prosecutors’ Office on Friday last week from the Jinhu Precinct of the Kinmen County Police Bureau. On Sunday, police, along with the National Immigration
GLOBALGIVING: ‘ Caving to external pressure is not acceptable for an organization that has cultivated justice reform and human rights for 30 years,’ one NGO said A slew of non-government organizations (NGOs) have withdrawn from the GlobalGiving fundraising platform after it announced it would use “Chinese Taipei” instead of “Taiwan” from next month. The Taiwan Good Rice Association wrote on Facebook on Friday that it was informed on April 28 via a teleconference call of the change, which was made because the platform wanted to operate in China. Taiwan Good Rice is to terminate all cooperative relationships with GlobalGiving in response to the platform’s “unilateral and non-negotiable” decision to remove references to Taiwan, the NGO said. “Taiwan is in the official name of Taiwan Good Rice Association and the
HEAVY WEATHER: Typhoon Jangmi is due to crash straight into the Ryukyus as airlines look to shift flights to larger aircraft or cancel flights to Okinawa entirely Taiwan’s international air carriers announced flight adjustments over the weekend as Typhoon Jangmi is forecast to hit the Ryukyu Islands today and tomorrow. The Central Weather Administration (CWA) upgraded Jangmi from a tropical storm to a typhoon at 8am yesterday, with the eye located 580km south of Naha city. It was moving north at 19kph. Today, China Airlines’ CI-120, CI-121, CI-122 and CI-123 flights between Taoyuan and Naha, Okinawa, have been canceled as well as CI-132 and CI-133 between Kaohsiung and Naha. EVA Air’s BR-112, BR-113, BR-186 and BR-185 flights between Taoyuan and Naha are also canceled. Low-cost carrier Tigerair Taiwan canceled IT-230,
MULTIPRONGED APPROACH: China has sought to pressure Palau across a number of fronts, but the island nation has staunchly resisted overtures to ditch Taiwan Palau has been firm in backing Taiwan despite Chinese pressure that uses tourism economics, cyberattacks and criminal infiltration as tools to threaten the Pacific ally into renouncing its recognition of Taiwan as a sovereign state. The Presidential Office yesterday announced that Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) would visit Palau from Saturday to Wednesday next week at the invitation of Palauan President Surangel Whipps Jr. Whipps in April said in an interview that China had outspokenly asked Palau to “denounce Taiwan.” “And we have said: ‘We have no enemies, but nobody tells us who our friends are,’” he said. Whipps has told reporters multiple times
RSS