Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators yesterday blasted the administration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) in another case of the government distributing calendars listing national holidays in China as among those observed in Taiwan, calling these incidents a product of its China-leaning policies and agenda to promote unification.
“From top to bottom, government [officials and workers] under President Ma are not clear about the nation's sovereignty and status,” DPP Legislator Chen Chi-yu (陳啟昱) told a press conference yesterday.
Given the government's confusing stance on sovereignty, “it's no wonder so many people [in government] are in the habit of taking actions that they think would please their superiors,” DPP Legislator Chen Chi-yu (陳啟昱) told a press conference yesterday.
Chen made the remarks in light of the latest incident in which 5,000 calendars distributed to the public by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' (MOFA) Eastern Taiwan Office in Hualien were found to contain three extra holidays — July 1, Oct. 1 and Dec. 26.
None of those dates are holidays in Taiwan, but they are celebrated in Hong Kong as the founding anniversary of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, the National Day of the People's Republic of China and the birthday of Mao Zedong (毛澤東) respectively.
Taiwan celebrates its national day on Oct. 10.
Chen said the ministry should be particularly sensitive to details like these, yet they have slipped through as though it regards China as the motherland.
DPP Legislator Hsueh Ling (薛凌) said this was the third case in which calendars distributed by government agencies carried inappropriate national holidays, adding that it was “an indication that the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government is preparing to unite with China.”
The first incident took place last October when calendars for this year that were distributed by the KMT-dominated Taoyuan County Council marked Oct. 1 as National Day and July 1 as Reunification Day.
Hsueh said that a set of free calendars produced by Taitung County Government's Department of Health last month were found to carry China's five-star national flag — not the Republic of China's (ROC) national flag — on the cover and listed Oct. 1 as National Day.
In both cases, local governments attributed the mistakes to negligence on the part of the printing companies.
“Why all these mistakes?” Hsueh asked, adding that these “seeming mistakes” were all part of the government's maneuverings. She did not elaborate.
At a separate setting yesterday, MOFA spokesman Henry Chen (陳銘政) said the blunder was unintentional.
The error was not detected during pre-publication proofreading because the sample calendar submitted by the publishing house was printed in black and white, while the finished product appeared in color, he said.
The publisher has apologized for the error and will publish a new version, he said.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY JENNY W. HSU AND CNA
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
Taiwan was ranked the fourth-safest country in the world with a score of 82.9, trailing only Andorra, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in Numbeo’s Safety Index by Country report. Taiwan’s score improved by 0.1 points compared with last year’s mid-year report, which had Taiwan fourth with a score of 82.8. However, both scores were lower than in last year’s first review, when Taiwan scored 83.3, and are a long way from when Taiwan was named the second-safest country in the world in 2021, scoring 84.8. Taiwan ranked higher than Singapore in ninth with a score of 77.4 and Japan in 10th with
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary