A visiting researcher from the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), a conservative US think tank, blamed the leadership of the People First Party (PFP) for holding hostage the long-stalled US arms procurement deal, but said he was optimistic the bill could eventually pass.
AEI research fellow Dan Blumenthal, who served from 2002 to last year as the head of Taiwan affairs in the Defense Department, said that rival parties in the legislature would likely be able to cut a deal were it not for PFP leadership.
"Below the leadership levels, people in the PFP who know the military matters will come to some sort of agreement with DPP," Blumenthal said. "This has become a political football. Once it goes to the defense committee with their experts, we believe strongly that something will pass."
Blumenthal said that a number of "serious PFP military types" realized Taiwan's need to upgrade its defense capabilities by passing the special arms budget.
Blumenthal made the comments after he and other researchers from the AEI met with Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (
AEI researcher Gary Schmitt, a former adviser to the Pentagon, told reporters that the KMT leader appeared to want to make progress on the bill.
"There is a sense that [Ma] would like to move forward on this, but that unfortunately, his junior partner in the [Legislature Yuan,] the PFP, is making that impossible to do it at this point," Schmitt said.
AEI president Christopher DeMuth yesterday urged Taiwan not to let political bickering stand in the way of national defense.
"It is a matter of concern to the United States and AEI that the politics in Taiwan has been interfering for a long time the necessary steps for prudent self-defense," DeMuth said.
Asked about former president Lee Teng-hui's (
"It would be very expensive to have the kind of capability that would actually matter if Taiwan were to go toward that kind of direction of striking capabilities. There is no defense on the cheap," Blumenthal said.
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
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TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) yesterday authorized the execution of convicted murderer Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), the first death row prisoner to be put to death since President William Lai (賴清德) took office. Huang was to be executed via a firing squad yesterday evening, which would leave Taiwan with 36 convicts on death row. Huang on Oct. 1, 2013, broke into his ex-girlfriend Wang Ping-chih’s (王品智) residence in New Taipei City, where he raped and murdered Wang. He also killed Wang’s mother. Huang was bitter over the breakup and her accusation that he had stolen NT$200,000 (US$6,074) from her bank account, prosecutors said
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