Eight EU member countries are to receive 1.3 million masks from Taiwan as part of its second batch of donations, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday, again urging the WHO to fully include the nation in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.
The masks are part of the nation’s humanitarian donation of 6 million masks announced on Thursday last week, with the rest going to the hardest-hit US states, countries covered by the government’s New Southbound Policy and those friendly to Taiwan.
While the ministry did not name the European recipients last week, Department of European Affairs Deputy Director-General Chen Yung-shao (陳詠韶) yesterday told a news briefing in Taipei that Austria, Denmark, Sweden, Slovakia, Slovenia and “Baltic Sea countries” — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania — are to receive 1.3 million masks in total.
Photo: Screen grab from the Facebook page of the Office of the Texas Secretary of State
The ministry hopes to deliver the masks to the countries as soon as possible, as people are dying from the disease every day, but it is uncertain when they will arrive, as flights have been reduced and there are restrictions to overland transportation in the continent, she said.
Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, the Holy See, Switzerland and the UK were among the recipients of a first round of mask donations announced on April 1.
“Delivery gratefully received! The surgical masks donated by Taiwan have now arrived in the UK where they will be distributed around our National Health Service. Thank you Taiwan!” the British Office Taipei wrote on Facebook yesterday.
The office of Texas Secretary of State Ruth Ruggero Hughs yesterday also wrote on Facebook that the state has received 100,000 masks from Taiwan, while presenting a certificate to Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Houston Director-General Peter Chen (陳家彥) thanking Taiwan for its support.
Meanwhile, Marion Smith, executive director of the US-based Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, on Monday wrote on Twitter that “the Chinese Communist Party lied to the world about #COVID19 and is using the World Health Organization as an instrument of propaganda.”
Asked about Smith’s remarks, ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou (歐江安) yesterday said the ministry had noticed his post and that the WHO should include all international stakeholders to ensure that information can be shared instantly and completely.
Taiwanese’s right to health is a humanitarian and human rights issue, Ou said, urging the WHO to discard political considerations and fully include Taiwan in its meetings and mechanisms.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
Instead of focusing solely on the threat of a full-scale military invasion, the US and its allies must prepare for a potential Chinese “quarantine” of Taiwan enforced through customs inspections, Stanford University Hoover fellow Eyck Freymann said in a Foreign Affairs article published on Wednesday. China could use various “gray zone” tactics in “reconfiguring the regional and ultimately the global economic order without a war,” said Freymann, who is also a nonresident research fellow at the US Naval War College. China might seize control of Taiwan’s links to the outside world by requiring all flights and ships entering or leaving Taiwan
The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
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