Ho Ching (何晶), the wife of Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍), on Thursday apologized to President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) for sharing a video on Facebook that criticized the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).
Ho wrote on Facebook a day earlier about meeting a Singaporean woman whose son suffered from serious tinnitus — a loud, persistent ringing in his ear — but who recovered after receiving treatment in Taiwan.
“Taiwan was a life saver for the son,” Ho wrote. “So for this and many other ways of support, I fully applaud Taiwan.”
However, the video shared with the post did not mention the boy’s story, but was a clip from a political commentary show hosted by Chen Feng-hsin (陳鳳馨) and Tang Hsiang-lung (唐湘龍).
The image for the video was a picture of Tsai next to the words “mask diplomacy fail.”
In the video, the two commentators criticize the DPP, accusing it of overindulging Taiwanese netizens, who they thought unfairly attacked Ho for a previous post she made on Facebook.
They also said the relationship between Taiwan and Singapore had become “hopeless.”
Ho on Thursday added a postscript to her post, saying that she did not agree with some parts of the video that were “clearly biased domestic political fights.”
She asked people to “please look past the cover photo for the video,” and apologized to Tsai.
“I owe the president of Taiwan a personal apology and hope to make amends in calmer times,” she wrote.
Despite apologizing, she did not take down the video.
On April 11, Ho stoked controversy when she shared an English-language news story about Taiwan donating masks to Singapore and captioned it “Errrr...”
The comment seemed to indicate that she was not keen on the plan.
A few days later, she updated the post, saying that she was grateful for Taiwan’s donation of masks.
She also said that “mistakes” had been forgiven, which has been widely interpreted as referring to Taiwan’s ban on mask exports, which has impacted mask supply to Singapore, as the city-state has two production lines in Taiwan.
Minister of Finance Su Jain-rong (蘇建榮) has said that before the ban took effect on Jan. 24, Singaporean mask manufacturer ST Engineering was given permission by the government to send N95 masks already packed for export to Singapore.
That batch of masks cleared customs on Jan. 29, before mask production equipment owned by the company was shipped back to Singapore on Feb. 12, Su said.
The first two F-16V Bock 70 jets purchased from the US are expected to arrive in Taiwan around Double Ten National Day, which is on Oct. 10, a military source said yesterday. Of the 66 F-16V Block 70 jets purchased from the US, the first completed production in March, the source said, adding that since then three jets have been produced per month. Although there were reports of engine defects, the issue has been resolved, they said. After the jets arrive in Taiwan, they must first pass testing by the air force before they would officially become Taiwan’s property, they said. The air force
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) yesterday said it had deployed patrol vessels to expel a China Coast Guard ship and a Chinese fishing boat near Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. The China Coast Guard vessel was 28 nautical miles (52km) northeast of Pratas at 6:15am on Thursday, approaching the island’s restricted waters, which extend 24 nautical miles from its shoreline, the CGA’s Dongsha-Nansha Branch said in a statement. The Tainan, a 2,000-tonne cutter, was deployed by the CGA to shadow the Chinese ship, which left the area at 2:39pm on Friday, the statement said. At 6:31pm on Friday,
The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy’s (PLAN) third aircraft carrier, the Fujian, would pose a steep challenge to Taiwan’s ability to defend itself against a full-scale invasion, a defense expert said yesterday. Institute of National Defense and Security Research analyst Chieh Chung (揭仲) made the comment hours after the PLAN confirmed the carrier recently passed through the Taiwan Strait to conduct “scientific research tests and training missions” in the South China Sea. China has two carriers in operation — the Liaoning and the Shandong — with the Fujian undergoing sea trials. Although the PLAN needs time to train the Fujian’s air wing and
STRIKE: Some travel agencies in Taiwan said that they were aware of the situation in South Korea, and that group tours to the country were proceeding as planned A planned strike by airport personnel in South Korea has not affected group tours to the country from Taiwan, travel agencies said yesterday. They added that they were closely monitoring the situation. Personnel at 15 airports, including Seoul’s Incheon and Gimpo airports, are to go on strike. They announced at a news conference on Tuesday that the strike would begin on Friday next week and continue until the Mid-Autumn Festival next month. Some travel agencies in Taiwan, including Cola Tour, Lion Travel, SET Tour and ezTravel, said that they were aware of the situation in South Korea, and that group
RSS