Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said in an interview about her presidential ambitions to be published tonight that supporters were in for a “surprise.”
“A lot of people look at me from a more traditional political point of view. [This] would likely be wrong,” the transcript of the two-hour interview with cable news station Era News quoted her as saying.
“Before 2008, I wasn’t your traditional Chinese Nationalist Party [KMT] or DPP politician. My thinking is possibly very different from that of other people,” she said.
The remarks marked the first time Tsai spoke openly with media on the possibility of a -presidential bid, which is likely to fuel rumors that she has presidential aspirations for 2012, regardless of whether she wins the November elections in the region to be known as Sinbei,
Asked what her reaction would be if supporters continued to press her to make a presidential bid, Tsai said she would take things one step at a time.
“People who know how I think and weigh my actions [would know] that the time is not ripe and that I will not make any decision prematurely,” she said.
“That’s because the decision could very well be the wrong decision,” Tsai said.
Of her current campaign for Sinbei, Tsai said: “My current choice is to be elected Sinbei City mayor.”
The 54-year-old Tsai, who has served as vice premier and chairperson of the Mainland -Affairs Council, is seen in some circles as one of the best chances the party has against President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) in 2012.
Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) said in a statement earlier this week that Tsai and Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌), the DPP’s candidate for Taipei City, were using the November elections as a springboard for the 2012 ticket.
In his view, Tsai had a good chance of representing the DPP in the presidential ballot, Chen said.
However, Tsai downplayed the comments, saying: “Even though I served under Chen, he doesn’t completely understand my future political path and political views.”
Tsai has yet to make a public pledge to serve out her term, a move that has attracted criticism from her KMT opponent, Eric Chu (朱立倫).
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comment last year on Tokyo’s potential reaction to a Taiwan-China conflict has forced Beijing to rewrite its invasion plans, a retired Japanese general said. Takaichi told the Diet on Nov. 7 last year that a Chinese naval blockade or military attack on Taiwan could constitute a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan, potentially allowing Tokyo to exercise its right to collective self-defense. Former Japan Ground Self-Defense Force general Kiyofumi Ogawa said in a recent speech that the remark has been interpreted as meaning Japan could intervene in the early stages of a Taiwan Strait conflict, undermining China’s previous assumptions
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
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