China’s infiltration of Taiwan is systematic, planned and targeted, with recent activity shifting from recruiting mid-level military officers to rank-and-file enlisted personnel, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said today.
The Legislative Yuan invited Tsai to deliver a report on bureau operations to its Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee.
China’s infiltration is systematic, in that it integrates national security, intelligence operations and “united front” work into a dense network to conduct intelligence gathering and espionage in Taiwan, he said.
Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times
It is also planned, with China using specific networks to screen targets through various exchange activities and recruiting local collaborators to establish intelligence-gathering organizations, he said.
Third, it is targeted, with those targets shifting toward lower-ranking military personnel on the grassroots level, he added.
Before the meeting, Tsai was asked by reporters about China’s reservation of five airspace zones for 40 days from March 27 until May 6.
Beijing is using military and political aims to probe US activities, Tsai said.
The designation would remain in place until almost exactly one week before a planned meeting between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), he said.
The zones stretch south from the Yellow Sea, facing South Korea, to the East China Sea, facing Japan, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.
Beijing has not given an official explanation or confirmed military exercises during this time, it said.
A US reconnaissance aircraft entered one of the reserved airspaces on Monday to conduct operations, indicating that China could be using the opportunity to test the US response, Tsai said.
Taiwan has also established an inter-agency notification mechanism to combat China’s “gray zone” maritime harassment and is actively exchanging Maritime Domain Awareness experience with international partners, he added.
Additional reporting by Fang Wei-li
China has reserved offshore airspace in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported yesterday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. These alerts, known as Notice to Air Missions (Notams), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert is
More than 6,000 Taiwanese students have participated in exchange programs in China over the past two years, despite the Mainland Affairs Council’s (MAC) “orange light” travel advisory, government records showed. The MAC’s publicly available registry showed that Taiwanese college and university students who went on exchange programs across the Strait numbered 3,592 and 2,966 people respectively. The National Immigration Agency data revealed that 2,296 and 2,551 Chinese students visited Taiwan for study in the same two years. A review of the Web sites of publicly-run universities and colleges showed that Taiwanese higher education institutions continued to recruit students for Chinese educational programs without
A bipartisan group of US senators has introduced a bill to enhance cooperation with Taiwan on drone development and to reduce reliance on supply chains linked to China. The proposed Blue Skies for Taiwan Act of 2026 was introduced by Republican US senators Ted Cruz and John Curtis, and Democratic US senators Jeff Merkley and Andy Kim. The legislation seeks to ease constraints on Taiwan-US cooperation in uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), including dependence on China-sourced components, limited access to capital and regulatory barriers under US export controls, a news release issued by Cruz on Wednesday said. The bill would establish a "Blue UAS
NAMING SPAT: The foreign ministry called on Denmark to propose an acceptable solution to the erroneous nationality used for Taiwanese on residence permits Taiwan has revoked some privileges for Danish diplomatic staff over a Danish permit that lists “Taiwan” as “China,” Eric Huang (黃鈞耀), head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Department of European Affairs, told a news conference in Taipei yesterday. Reporters asked Huang whether the Danish government had responded to the ministry’s request that it correct the nationality on Danish residence permits of Taiwanese, which has been listed as “China” since 2024. Taiwan’s representative office in Denmark continues to communicate with the Danish government, and the ministry has revoked some privileges previously granted to Danish representatives in Taiwan and would continue to review
RSS