The Miaoli Armed Forces Reserve Command does not have plans to store ammunition at local temples, it said on Monday, despite a previous communique seemingly asking temple overseers to do just that.
Chinese-language media on Sunday reported that at least three temples in Miaoli County were asked to allow the military to stockpile ammunition on their property if war were to break out.
A document dated June 17 purported to be a letter from the Miaoli command to a temple asked temple managers to authorize the military to stockpile ammunition on temple grounds for reserve brigades in the event of an imminent conflict.
However, the command said in a statement on Monday that it had no plans to stockpile ammunition in temples and that its request was for local temples to take part in the military’s logistics resilience exercises.
Taiwanese are urged to cooperate with efforts to bolster the combat preparedness of the armed forces, as national security cannot be maintained without the support of the public, it said.
Jiouhu Village (九湖) Warden Tseng I-nan (曾義男) on Monday said that the military had called him to apologize for causing controversy regarding the Tianbao Temple (天寶寺) and that the ammunition storage plan had been scrapped.
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Tseng said he disagreed with the plan because using religious sites for military purposes is banned under international law and using a local institution for ammunition storage could spark panic among residents.
The village has halted efforts to organize a petition against the military’s plans and is waiting on the command to send a formal letter to rescind it, Tseng said, adding that the sooner the controversy is ended, the better.
A member of Tianbao Temple’s management team said on condition of anonymity that the command mistakenly believed that the chairperson of the board had the authority and the state of mind to agree to a storage deal.
However, the chairperson is elderly and infirm, which would make any agreement they made with the government unreasonable and illegal, the source said.
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