The European parliament on Thursday passed a report that for the first time took note of President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) peace initiative over the disputed Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) in the East China Sea.
The report says the parliament “takes note of Taiwan’s initiative with a view to reaching a consensus on a code of conduct for the East China Sea and the establishment of a mechanism allowing all sides to cooperate in the joint exploitation of the region’s natural resources, including capacity for the generation of electricity from renewable sources.”
The report adds that the EU welcomed the increasing exchanges between China and Taiwan, and it stresses the improvement in cross-strait ties, but says that relations “are still being seriously undermined by Chinese missiles aimed at Taiwan and by China’s international isolation of Taiwan.”
The report also supports Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations and says that the EU was “pleased” to see millions of Chinese citizens observe via the Internet Taiwan’s presidential and legislative elections on Jan. 14 last year.
The EU recognizes strong cross-strait economic ties, the opening up of Taiwan to Chinese tourists and cultural cooperation, and it also considers the internationalization of trade and investment to be the best guarantor of Taiwan’s stability, the report says.
In addition, the EU urges Taiwan’s government to “accompany its investment in China with investments elsewhere,” it says.
The report, titled EU-China Relations, was written by Bastiaan Belder and includes sections on EU-China strategy, human rights and democracy, cross-strait relations and foreign policy.
Proposed last year, Ma’s peace initiative calls on all parties involved in territorial disputes to refrain from hostile action, to put aside their differences, not to abandon dialogue, to observe international law and resolve disputes through peaceful means.
All parties should also seek consensus on a code of conduct for the East China Sea and establish a mechanism for cooperation on exploring and developing resources in the region, Ma has said.
Located about 120 nautical miles (220km) northeast of Taipei, the Diaoyutai Islands, known as the Senkakus in Japan, are claimed by Taiwan, Japan and China.
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:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
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