The international community needs to increase their navigations through the Taiwan Strait, using clear and concrete actions to demonstrate freedom of navigation and other norms that help maintain the international order, experts said yesterday.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) in an article published on Thursday on the Foreign Affairs Web site called for more actions to be taken by the international community to maintain the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait, including freedom of navigation.
About 50 percent of cargo container ships pass through the Taiwan Strait daily. As such, many countries have conducted missions to demonstrate freedom of navigation in the Strait.
Photo: AFP, US Navy, Ismael Martinez
The US Navy Burke-class missile destroyer USS Halsey exercised freedom of navigation rights through the Taiwan Strait on Wednesday last week, marking the third time it has passed through the Strait this year.
On Tuesday last week, the German Federal Ministry of Defense announced that it would send two warships to the Indo-Pacific region to uphold freedom of navigation. France enacted legislation last year to protect freedom of navigation in the Taiwan Strait, the first of its kind in the world.
China has been trying to internalize the Taiwan Strait by dispatching military aircraft to fly near Taiwan.
Kuma Academy founder Ho Cheng-hui (何澄輝) yesterday said that the Taiwan Strait is one of the world’s geopolitical hot spots, adding that actions are necessary to uphold widely accepted international norms.
“Without concrete actions, it might encourage China and other authoritarian regimes to engage in risky behavior,” Ho said. “Increases in actions are necessary to deter authoritarian regimes.”
The Taiwan Strait is an important international trade passage as a significant percentage of the Strait is classified as international waters, Ho said.
“The appearance of military aircraft is to ensure that freedom of navigation is protected, and that regional peace, security and stability can be maintained,” he said, adding that many countries have conducted similar tasks in the Red Sea.
In other developments, Taiwan has since 2021 increased cooperation with the Philippines in coastal patrol affairs by training Philippine Coast Guard officers at Central Police University, the Coast Guard Administration said yesterday.
The administration did not comment further on whether the program has also trained officers to counter increasing harassment from the China Coast Guard.
However, the administration invited Philippine Coast Guard officials to Taiwan to observe the Haian No. 11 drill that was conducted last year.
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) today issued a sea warning for Typhoon Fung-wong effective from 5:30pm, while local governments canceled school and work for tomorrow. A land warning is expected to be issued tomorrow morning before it is expected to make landfall on Wednesday, the agency said. Taoyuan, and well as Yilan, Hualien and Penghu counties canceled work and school for tomorrow, as well as mountainous district of Taipei and New Taipei City. For updated information on closures, please visit the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration Web site. As of 5pm today, Fung-wong was about 490km south-southwest of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan's southernmost point.
A magnitude 5.3 earthquake struck Kaohsiung at 1pm today, the Central Weather Administration said. The epicenter was in Jiasian District (甲仙), 72.1km north-northeast of Kaohsiung City Hall, at a depth of 7.8km, agency data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage. The earthquake's intensity, which gauges the actual effects of a temblor, was highest in Kaohsiung and Tainan, where it measured a 4 on Taiwan's seven-tier intensity scale. It also measured a 3 in parts of Chiayi City, as well as Pingtung, Yunlin and Hualien counties, data showed.
Nearly 5 million people have signed up to receive the government’s NT$10,000 (US$322) universal cash handout since registration opened on Wednesday last week, with deposits expected to begin tomorrow, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. After a staggered sign-up last week — based on the final digit of the applicant’s national ID or Alien Resident Certificate number — online registration is open to all eligible Taiwanese nationals, foreign permanent residents and spouses of Taiwanese nationals. Banks are expected to start issuing deposits from 6pm today, the ministry said. Those who completed registration by yesterday are expected to receive their NT$10,000 tomorrow, National Treasury
Taiwan next year plans to launch its first nationwide census on elderly people living independently to identify the estimated 700,000 seniors to strengthen community-based healthcare and long-term care services, the Ministry of Health and Welfare (MOHW) said yesterday. Minister of Health and Welfare Shih Chung-liang (石崇良) said on the sidelines of a healthcare seminar that the nation’s rapidly aging population and declining birthrate have made the issue of elderly people living alone increasingly pressing. The survey, to be jointly conducted by the MOHW and the Ministry of the Interior, aims to establish baseline data and better allocate care resources, he
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