A majority of respondents view President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) response to China’s demarcation of its East China Sea air defense identification zone (ADIZ) as “too soft,” a public opinion survey conducted by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has shown.
Of the 1,338 valid responses, 75.2 percent said that the Civil Aeronautics Administration should not comply with China’s request for flight plans, while 15.4 percent agreed with the move, according to the DPP poll conducted on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Of those polled, 64.6 percent said Ma’s response to China’s unilateral demarcation has been “too soft,” with 23 percent of respondents saying Ma’s response was “fine,” 2 percent saying it was “too strong,” and 10.4 percent not giving an answer.
“It was not a surprise that Ma’s reaction has been interpreted as weak. After all, even Philippine Ambassador to the US Jose Cuisia urged Taiwan to voice concerns to China about the establishment of the zone and US Vice President Joe Biden called for Beijing to exercise restraint on the issue,” DPP spokesperson Lin Chun-hsien (林俊憲) told a press conference yesterday.
In response to Ma’s comment that the zone was “not connected to sovereignty,” 75.2 percent of respondents said they disagreed with the statement, including 52 percent who indicated “strong objection.”
Asked if Beijing’s request for flight plans was reasonable, 72.2 percent of those polled said “no,” including 49.2 percent who said it was “very unreasonable,” however, 15.9 percent said it was reasonable and 11.9 percent had no opinion.
When asked what would be an appropriate response to the situation, 62.4 percent of respondents said the nation should join Japan, South Korea and the US in lodging a protest with China, while 28.4 percent disagreed with that approach and 9.2 percent did not give an opinion.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
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,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods