The Taiwan Statebuilding Party yesterday warned the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to be on guard against Chinese infiltration of Taiwan at the grassroots level, citing a complaint about the business card of Pingtung County’s Hengchun Township (恆春) Mayor Lu Yu-tung (盧玉棟) as an example.
Party Chairman Chen Yi-chi (陳奕齊) said that he received the complaint from a Taiwanese expatriate who attended a sister city event between Hengchung and Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, in Miami on Wednesday.
The business card Lu handed out at the event featured five stars that greatly resembled those found on the Chinese national flag, Chen cited the expatriate as saying.
Photo: Taipei Times
He quoted the expatriate as saying: “I almost thought that I was attending an event by Chinese Hengchun.”
Lu was attending an official event and meeting with the mayor of Sunny Isles Beach, Chen said, adding that the business card is proof that China has already succeeded in infiltrating Taiwan from the bottom up.
China is attempting to use low-level Taiwanese officials to propagate the illusion that China rules Taiwan, he said.
“When foreigners take that business card, Taiwan has already become an inseparable part of China,” Chen said.
The Hengchun Township Office said that Lu is overseas and unavailable for comment, but added that the five stars on his business card are green, not red.
The word chun (春) is printed in the middle of the largest star, the office said, adding that the expatriate might have misread it, as it was printed in artistic form.
The issue was raised four years ago when Lu was campaigning for mayor, the office said.
At the time, Lu said that the five stars on his business card represented “five-star service,” not China, adding that the design also put Chinese visitors at ease and makes them feel “comfortable.”
If Chinese tourists stop visiting Hengchun, the local hotel industry could be in serious trouble, he said, adding that the township had few other work opportunities.
However, some residents have said that Chinese are not the only visitors to Hengchun and that efforts to make them feel at ease should not necessitate turning it into a “communist town,” while others have said that they feel there is nothing wrong with the business card design.
‘NEVER!’ Taiwan FactCheck Center said it had only received donations from the Open Society Foundations, which supports nonprofits that promote democratic values Taiwan FactCheck Center (TFC) has never received any donation from the US Agency for International Development (USAID), a cofounder of the organization wrote on his Facebook page on Sunday. The Taipei-based organization was established in 2018 by Taiwan Media Watch Foundation and the Association of Quality Journalism to monitor and verify news and information accuracy. It was officially registered as a foundation in 2021. National Chung Cheng University communications professor Lo Shih-hung (羅世宏), a cofounder and chairman of TFC, was responding to online rumors that the TFC receives funding from the US government’s humanitarian assistance agency via the Open Society Foundations (OSF),
An alleged US government plan to encourage Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) to form a joint venture with Intel to boost US chipmaking would place the Taiwanese foundry giant in a more disadvantageous position than proposed tariffs on imported chips, a semiconductor expert said yesterday. If TSMC forms a joint venture with its US rival, it faces the risk of technology outflow, said Liu Pei-chen (劉佩真), a researcher at the Taiwan Industry Economics Database of the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research. A report by international financial services firm Baird said that Asia semiconductor supply chain talks suggest that the US government would
ANNUAL LIGHT SHOW: The lanterns are exhibited near Taoyuan’s high-speed rail station and around the Taoyuan Sports Park Station of the airport MRT line More than 400 lanterns are to be on display at the annual Taiwan Lantern Festival, which officially starts in Taoyuan today. The city is hosting the festival for the second time — the first time was in 2016. The Tourism Administration held a rehearsal of the festival last night. Chunghwa Telecom donated the main lantern of the festival to the Taoyuan City Government. The lanterns are exhibited in two main areas: near the high-speed rail (HSR) station in Taoyuan, which is at the A18 station of the Taoyuan Airport MRT, and around the Taoyuan Sports Park Station of the MRT
Starlux Airlines on Tuesday announced it is to launch new direct flights from Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport to Ontario, California, on June 2. The carrier said it plans to deploy the new-generation Airbus A350 on the Taipei-Ontario route. The Airbus A350 features a total of 306 seats, including four in first class, 26 in business class, 36 in premium economy and 240 in economy. According to Starlux’s initial schedule, four flights would run between Taoyuan and Ontario per week: Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. Flights are to depart from Taoyuan at 8:05pm and arrive in California at 5:05pm (local time), while return flights
RSS