Two giant pandas made a trip from Sichuan Province, China, to their new home in Taiwan yesterday. Tuan Tuan (團團) and Yuan Yuan (圓圓), both four years old, arrived at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport at 5:02pm.
The pandas, whose Chinese names, when put together, mean “to reunite,” were offered to former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Lien Chan (連戰) during his visit to China in May, 2005.
The pair were selected from 23 panda cubs early in 2006 after an eight-month process. China claimed the names were decided by a public poll that received more than 100 million votes from the Chinese people.
EVA Air (EVA,長榮航空) decorated the cabin of the plane used for yesterday’s charter flight with posters of pandas. Meals offered on board also were designed in patterns of pandas.
Officials from the Bureau of Animal and Plant Health and Inspection and Quarantine boarded the aircraft after it landed at the airport and conducted a preliminary inspection.
While some of the officials reviewed documents, others inspected the pandas and bamboo brought from China. Chinese caretakers carried three cases of bamboo, each weighing 75kg.
“Our inspectors took [the pandas’] temperature and inspected their eyes and excrement,” said Shen Guo-san (沈國三), director of the bureau’s Hsinchu office.
The two pandas were then transported to Taipei City Zoo in a temperature-controlled truck, escorted by police cars. They reached their new home at around 7:30pm.
Upon arrival, the bamboo was unloaded, washed and used to line a quarantine cell for the animals.
Tuan Tuan, the male panda, entered the cell following a trail of sliced apples, which handlers said was his favorite food.
“They are shy in an unfamiliar environment,” said the zoo’s top veterinarian, Jason Chin (金仕謙). In addition to 6kg of imported bamboo, another 6kg of Taiwanese bamboo was put in the cell, Chin said.
A few minutes later, Yuan Yuan, a female, joined her partner and entered the cell. The pair paced back and forth for more than 30 minutes, after which Yuan Yuan began munching on a piece of apple and both pandas began eating the Taiwanese bamboo.
The animals will kept in quarantine for at least 30 days before being displayed to the public, Chin said.
“If everything — including the health examination and diet evaluation — goes well, the animals will have their last day of quarantine on the 23rd of next month,” he said.
In the meantime, a camera will be kept in the cell to provide a video feed so the public can view the pandas, he said.
“Every day at noon, a video [with selected footage] from the pandas’ previous day will be uploaded onto the zoo’s Web site,” he said.
When asked when the pair might produce their first cub, Chin said that Yuan Yuan had been in heat last year, but “the zoo will wait for Tuan-tuan to become sexually mature in the next two years before letting the pair mate.”
Responding to reporters’ questions on whether the pandas’ names would be changed, Chin said: “We respect these individuals, who have been called these names for four to five years. They have also learned to respond to these names ... At the moment, there are no plans to change their names.”
The pandas were taken from their enclosures at the Ya’an breeding center in Sichuan Province before dawn yesterday.
The keepers led the pandas into metal crates, locked them and handed them bamboo sprouts as a farewell gift.
Once the animals had been loaded onto a truck, children dressed as pandas performed a dance in a small ceremony bidding farewell to the pandas.
“I’m sad to see the pandas go, but I’m happy that Taiwanese children can experience the cute animals,” said Guo Jie, an 18-year-old student at a technical college.
The pandas were transported to Chengdu to board a Taipei-bound jet along with some 20 Chinese animal experts and their two original keepers, who will stay in Taiwan for two months.
Zheng Lizhong (鄭立中), deputy director of China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, had said before the pandas’ departure: “Tuan Tuan and Yuan Yuan will sow the seeds of peace, solidarity and friendship on Taiwan’s soil.”
Also See: PANDA DIPLOMACY: ANALYSIS: Pandas part of Beijing’s ‘internalization’ plan
The CIA has a message for Chinese government officials worried about their place in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government: Come work with us. The agency released two Mandarin-language videos on social media on Thursday inviting disgruntled officials to contact the CIA. The recruitment videos posted on YouTube and X racked up more than 5 million views combined in their first day. The outreach comes as CIA Director John Ratcliffe has vowed to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China, which has recently targeted US officials with its own espionage operations. The videos are “aimed at
STEADFAST FRIEND: The bills encourage increased Taiwan-US engagement and address China’s distortion of UN Resolution 2758 to isolate Taiwan internationally The Presidential Office yesterday thanked the US House of Representatives for unanimously passing two Taiwan-related bills highlighting its solid support for Taiwan’s democracy and global participation, and for deepening bilateral relations. One of the bills, the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, requires the US Department of State to periodically review its guidelines for engagement with Taiwan, and report to the US Congress on the guidelines and plans to lift self-imposed limitations on US-Taiwan engagement. The other bill is the Taiwan International Solidarity Act, which clarifies that UN Resolution 2758 does not address the issue of the representation of Taiwan or its people in
US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo on Friday expressed concern over the rate at which China is diversifying its military exercises, the Financial Times (FT) reported on Saturday. “The rates of change on the depth and breadth of their exercises is the one non-linear effect that I’ve seen in the last year that wakes me up at night or keeps me up at night,” Paparo was quoted by FT as saying while attending the annual Sedona Forum at the McCain Institute in Arizona. Paparo also expressed concern over the speed with which China was expanding its military. While the US
SHIFT: Taiwan’s better-than-expected first-quarter GDP and signs of weakness in the US have driven global capital back to emerging markets, the central bank head said The central bank yesterday blamed market speculation for the steep rise in the local currency, and urged exporters and financial institutions to stay calm and stop panic sell-offs to avoid hurting their own profitability. The nation’s top monetary policymaker said that it would step in, if necessary, to maintain order and stability in the foreign exchange market. The remarks came as the NT dollar yesterday closed up NT$0.919 to NT$30.145 against the US dollar in Taipei trading, after rising as high as NT$29.59 in intraday trading. The local currency has surged 5.85 percent against the greenback over the past two sessions, central
RSS