Taiwan and Japan yesterday signed a new air transportation agreement in which two new airline routes from Taipei to Komatsu and from Taipei to Miyazaki were added, bringing the number of regular airline routes between the two countries from eight to 10.
Additionally, the route from Taipei to Osaka will be extended to Los Angeles or Seattle in the US, according to the provisions of the agreement.
Taiwan and Japan also agreed that airlines from both countries can operate code-share flights, part of a cooperative services agreement between two carriers meaning that a flight operated by an airline is jointly marketed as a flight for one or more other airlines.
According to the agreement, which takes effect immediately, Japan designated Japan Airlines International Co Ltd (JAL) and All Nippon Airways (ANA) will fly the airline routes between the two countries, taking the place of their respective subsidiary companies Japan Asia Airways (JAA) and Air Nippon (ANK).
Japan also designated Nippon Cargo Airlines (NCA) to provide air cargo transportation services between the two countries.
An official with the Ministry of Transportation and Communication's Civil Aeronautics Administration told the Taipei Times that JAA and ANK were established specifically to operate routes between Taiwan and Japan as a result of Chinese opposition to ANA and JAL flying to Taiwan.
"That JAL and ANA took over the routes reflects the close relationships between Taiwan and Japan," said the official, who refused to give his name.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday lauded the new air transportation agreement between Taiwan and Japan as evidence of the substantial progress in relations between the two countries.
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
Police have issued warnings against traveling to Cambodia or Thailand when others have paid for the travel fare in light of increasing cases of teenagers, middle-aged and elderly people being tricked into traveling to these countries and then being held for ransom. Recounting their ordeal, one victim on Monday said she was asked by a friend to visit Thailand and help set up a bank account there, for which they would be paid NT$70,000 to NT$100,000 (US$2,136 to US$3,051). The victim said she had not found it strange that her friend was not coming along on the trip, adding that when she
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to