The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday denied that president-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) is assuring Beijing that she would not pursue Taiwanese independence, as Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) researcher Bonnie Glaser wrote in a report.
In a report released by the CSIS titled: Prospects for Cross-Strait Relations as Tsai Ing-wen Assumes the Presidency in Taiwan, Glaser cited an unnamed DPP source as saying that Tsai “is attempting to provide reassurances to the [People’s Republic of China] that she will not pursue Taiwan independence not only through words, but also in her actions.”
Glaser went on to give the DPP’s version of the cross-strait agreement supervisory act as an example and said that “Tsai consciously took into account Beijing’s concerns about the use of terminology that might imply a state-to-state relationship, opting to use the term ‘cross-strait,’ instead of ‘China-Taiwan.’”
“We have no idea who the so-called ‘source’ is and why they made such remarks, but whether in a public or a private setting, Tsai has always remained consistent in her stance [on cross-strait issue] — maintaining the ‘status quo’ — and has never made statements like those quoted in the report,” DPP spokesperson Ruan Jhao-syong (阮昭雄) said yesterday.
Ruan went on to say that maintaining the “status quo” across the Taiwan Strait and stable development of cross-strait relations is the widely accepted consensus in Taiwanese society, and all sides would benefit from it.
“Tsai explained her ideas very well during a speech at the CSIS,” Ruan said. “She will put in place that policy direction to keep the Taiwan Strait peaceful and stable after being sworn in as president.”
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,