Police today said they are stepping up patrols throughout the Taipei MRT system, after a social media user threatened to detonate a bomb at an unspecified station this afternoon.
Although they strongly believe the threat to be unsubstantiated, Taipei Metro police and the Railway Police Bureau still said that security and patrols would be heightened through the system.
Many copycat messages have been posted since Friday’s stabbing attacks at Taipei Main Station and near Zhongshan MRT Station that left three dead and 11 injured, police said.
Photo: Wang Yi-sung, Taipei Times
Last night, a Threads user in a post said they would detonate a bomb on the Taipei MRT system at 1:30pm today, without specifying where.
The metro police said officers have increased patrols between stations and are thoroughly searching areas such as trash cans, restrooms and stairwells.
The bureau also said it has dispatched officers to stations shared with the MRT, including Songshan, Nangang, Taipei Main and Banqiao stations in close conjunction with local police.
Taiwan Railway Corp said it has increased security at its stations integrated with metro systems nationwide.
The stations include Songshan, Nangang and Taipei railway stations in Taipei; Banqiao station in New Taipei City; Songzhu, Daqing and Xinwuri stations in Taichung; and Xinzuoying in Kaohsiung.
The Taipei Police Department has also stepped up security, deploying 1,579 officers throughout the city, with 320 stationed at metro facilities.
Additional reporting by CNA
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
RSS