US representatives yesterday made comments on Twitter in support of Taiwan regarding China’s unilateral announcement of new flight routes in the Taiwan Strait.
Beijing unilaterally announced the launch of the M503 northbound route on Jan. 4 without consulting Taiwan. The route is only 4.2 nautical miles, or approximately 7.8km, west of the median line of the Taiwan Strait at its closest point.
Three Chinese east-west extension routes also introduced on Jan. 4 — designated W121, W122 and W123 — overlap with Taiwan’s W6, W8 and W2 flight routes, which serve the outlying islands of Matsu and Kinmen, raising aviation safety concerns.
Photo: Chen Yi-chia, Taipei Times
“China’s new flight routes around Taiwan, activated without consulting Taipei, threaten aviation security and the cross-strait status quo,” tweeted US Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who previously served as the chairwoman of the US House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
“Our admin must lodge a strong complaint with Beijing and the International Civil Aviation Organization, making clear that these unilateral provocations endanger regional stability,” Ros-Lehtinen added.
“China unilaterally expanding air routes near Taiwan without consulting Taiwanese authorities harms the longstanding cross-strait status quo,” US Representative Sheila Jackson Lee tweeted. “Any decision involving activity across the strait should be decided by both countries.”
The nation’s Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) on Friday expressed “strong regret” over China’s condemnation of Taiwan’s move to put extra cross-strait flights for the Lunar New Year holiday on hold amid a dispute over the controversial M503 route.
In a statement on its official Web site, the Civil Aviation Administration of China condemned Taiwan’s move to delay approval of applications by two China-based airlines to operate extra flights in protest of China’s decision to launch a northbound M503 route.
The M503 route and its extension routes were approved by the International Civil Aviation Organization and entail “no safety concerns,” it said.
It also said Taiwan’s act of “revenge against China” would eventually hurt airlines and people from both sides of the Taiwan Strait — the rights of Taiwanese in particular — and that “the Taiwanese authority should take full responsibility for all the consequences.”
In response, the CAA on Friday night issued a statement titled “If there is no trust and no aviation safety, what’s the point of talking about the rights of Taiwanese business people?”
The CAA urged China to start negotiations with Taiwan as soon as possible, in line with an agreement reached by the two sides in 2015.
The CAA on Thursday said it has put on hold applications by China Eastern and Xiamen Air to fly a total of 176 additional cross-strait flights during the holiday period from Feb. 15 to 20, in response to China’s launch of the M503 route, which Taiwan considers a threat to aviation safety.
Taiwanese scientists have engineered plants that can capture about 50 percent more carbon dioxide and produce more than twice as many seeds as unmodified plants, a breakthrough they hope could one day help mitigate global warming and grow more food staples such as rice. If applied to major food crops, the new system could cut carbon emissions and raise yields “without additional equipment or labor costs,” Academia Sinica researcher and lead author the study Lu Kuan-jen (呂冠箴) said. Academia Sinica president James Liao (廖俊智) said that as humans emit 9.6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide compared with the 220 billion tonnes absorbed
The Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) Wanda-Zhonghe Line is 81.7 percent complete, with public opening targeted for the end of 2027, New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said today. Surrounding roads are to be open to the public by the end of next year, Hou said during an inspection of construction progress. The 9.5km line, featuring nine underground stations and one depot, is expected to connect Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall Station to Chukuang Station in New Taipei City’s Jhonghe District (中和). All 18 tunnels for the line are complete, while the main structures of the stations and depot are mostly finished, he
Taipei is to implement widespread road closures around Taipei 101 on Friday to make way for large crowds during the Double Ten National Day celebration, the Taipei Department of Transportation said. A four-minute fireworks display is to be launched from the skyscraper, along with a performance by 500 drones flying in formation above the nearby Nanshan A21 site, starting at 10pm. Vehicle restrictions would occur in phases, they said. From 5pm to 9pm, inner lanes of Songshou Road between Taipei City Hall and Taipei 101 are to be closed, with only the outer lanes remaining open. Between 9pm and 9:40pm, the section is
China’s plan to deploy a new hypersonic ballistic missile at a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) base near Taiwan likely targets US airbases and ships in the western Pacific, but it would also present new threats to Taiwan, defense experts said. The New York Times — citing a US Department of Defense report from last year on China’s military power — on Monday reported in an article titled “The missiles threatening Taiwan” that China has stockpiled 3,500 missiles, 1.5 times more than four years earlier. Although it is unclear how many of those missiles were targeting Taiwan, the newspaper reported
RSS