The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday dismissed allegations that the Swiss government has changed details on driver’s licenses issued to Taiwanese nationals from “Taiwan” to “China” since last month, saying there is no such policy.
“After verification with the Representative Office of Taiwan in Bern, Switzerland, we are certain that there is no policy to list Taiwanese citizens’ home nation as ‘China’ on driver’s licenses issued to Taiwanese by the Swiss government,” ministry spokesman Andrew Lee (李憲章) said in a statement yesterday.
Lee said that since a reciprocal driver’s license agreement between Taipei and Bern took effect on Aug. 1, 2007, licenses issued by Switzerland to Taiwanese have always listed their home nation as “TWN” or Taiwan.
The ministry’s remarks were in response to claims made on Facebook earlier this week by a Taiwanese woman based in Switzerland, surnamed Tsai (蔡), who said a staff member at a motor registry office in Zurich informed her of the policy change in late January when she applied for a driver’s license.
“Motor registry staff told me that the office recently received a letter from Beijing [requesting the change] and that from February, all Swiss driver’s licenses issued to Taiwanese nationals would list their home nation as ‘China,’” Tsai wrote on Facebook.
The staff member said Tsai was “lucky” to have applied for her license before the change, Tsai said.
Tsai made the claims after reports that the Swedish Tax Agency on Monday changed the designation for Taiwan from “Taiwan ROC [Republic of China]” to “Taiwan, Province of China” in accordance with the International Organization for Standardization standard 3166.
The designation change prompted a Taiwanese resident of Sweden to launch a petition to urge the Swedish government to remove the “offensive term.”
“Swedish authorities take this ‘administrative measure’ without any regard for the consequences for affected individuals, by directly or indirectly serving the interests of the People’s Republic of China,” said the petition, which had collected more than 14,000 signatures as of press time last night.
An increase in Taiwanese boats using China-made automatic identification systems (AIS) could confuse coast guards patrolling waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast and become a loophole in the national security system, sources familiar with the matter said yesterday. Taiwan ADIZ, a Facebook page created by enthusiasts who monitor Chinese military activities in airspace and waters off Taiwan’s southwest coast, on Saturday identified what seemed to be a Chinese cargo container ship near Penghu County. The Coast Guard Administration went to the location after receiving the tip and found that it was a Taiwanese yacht, which had a Chinese AIS installed. Similar instances had also
GOOD DIPLOMACY: The KMT has maintained close contact with representative offices in Taiwan and had extended an invitation to Russia as well, the KMT said The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) would “appropriately handle” the fallout from an invitation it had extended to Russia’s representative to Taipei to attend its international banquet last month, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday. US and EU representatives in Taiwan boycotted the event, and only later agreed to attend after the KMT rescinded its invitation to the Russian representative. The KMT has maintained long-term close contact with all representative offices and embassies in Taiwan, and had extended the invitation as a practice of good diplomacy, Chu said. “Some EU countries have expressed their opinions of Russia, and the KMT respects that,” he
VIGILANCE: The military is paying close attention to actions that might damage peace and stability in the region, the deputy minister of national defense said The People’s Republic of China (PRC) might consider initiating a hack on Taiwanese networks on May 20, the day of the inauguration ceremony of president-elect William Lai (賴清德), sources familiar with cross-strait issues said. While US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s statement of the US expectation “that all sides will conduct themselves with restraint and prudence in the period ahead” would prevent military actions by China, Beijing could still try to sabotage Taiwan’s inauguration ceremony, the source said. China might gain access to the video screens outside of the Presidential Office Building and display embarrassing messages from Beijing, such as congratulating Lai
Four China Coast Guard ships briefly sailed through prohibited waters near Kinmen County, Taipei said, urging Beijing to stop actions that endanger navigation safety. The Chinese ships entered waters south of Kinmen, 5km from the Chinese city of Xiamen, at about 3:30pm on Monday, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement later the same day. The ships “sailed out of our prohibited and restricted waters” about an hour later, the agency said, urging Beijing to immediately stop “behavior that endangers navigation safety.” Ministry of National Defense spokesman Sun Li-fang (孫立方) yesterday told reporters that Taiwan would boost support to the Coast Guard