DIPLOMACY
Graham sends warning
If the US fails to back Ukraine enough in the war against Russia, that would send a signal to China that it could take Taiwan, US Senator Lindsey Graham said during a visit to Kyiv on Friday. Graham, a Republican, said after meeting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy that US President Joe Biden should send more weapons to Ukraine in addition to the more than US$35 billion of weaponry and military hardware already provided. “There can be no backing off of helping Ukraine because if we fail here, there goes Taiwan,” Graham told reporters. “If you’re running for president, as a Republican or Democrat, I don’t know how you can make the argument that we’re stronger against China if we pull the plug on Ukraine — that makes zero sense. What I want the Chinese to see is that invading a neighbor is not as easy as it looks.” “The best way to protect Taiwan and world order is for [Russian President Vladimir] Putin to lose,” he added.
SOCIETY
Children swept out to sea
A 12-year-old boy has been found dead and a female junior-high school student remains missing after the two were swept out to sea in separate incidents along the east coast yesterday, local authorities said. Emergency services in Hualien County at about noon received a report of a child at sea. Coast guard personnel rescued the boy, surnamed Chou (周), but failed to locate a second boy, surnamed Lee (李), who was also missing. Lee, Chou and a third boy had been playing on the shore when Chou was swept into the sea by a strong wave, police said. Lee jumped in the water to rescue him, while the other boy ran home to call for help. Lee was later found unresponsive with a head injury. Meanwhile, authorities continued to search for a female student, surnamed Liu (柳), who went missing after being swept into the sea while walking along the shore in Yilan County.
DIPLOMACY
NZ lawmakers to visit
Two New Zealand lawmakers are to visit Taiwan from today through Thursday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced yesterday. They are to meet with senior officials to discuss issues of mutual concern, it said. Brooke Van Velden, deputy head of ACT New Zealand, and James McDowall, ACT spokesperson for Immigration, Defense, Tourism, Internal Affairs, Economic Development, Civil Defense, and Research, Science, and Innovation, are members of the New Zealand All-Party Parliamentary Group, which was formed in March to promote exchanges with Taiwanese lawmakers. This year also marks the 10th anniversary of the signing of the Taiwan-New Zealand economic cooperation agreement.
SOCIETY
Body of river tracer found
The remains of a river tracing group member swept away by a surging waterfall in Pingtung County last weekend were recovered on Saturday, rescuers said. The remains of the man surnamed Hsiao (蕭) were spotted on Friday, but search-and-rescue personnel were unable to retrieve the body until the next day due to poor weather conditions, the county’s Bureau of Fire and Emergency Services said. The incident occurred at the Flying Dragon Waterfall in Wutai Township (霧台) on May 20, when five of the 10-people group were swept away by surging waters triggered by heavy rainfall. The remaining members of the group were stranded on a cliff and rescued by a helicopter the following morning.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
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