China’s Internet chatrooms were brimming with anger yesterday after a Chinese fishing boat captain died and another went missing following a collision with a South Korean coast guard ship on Saturday.
Beijing has so far refrained from official comment about the incident, in which a trawler collided with the South Korean vessel and capsized on Saturday in the Yellow Sea, according to South Korean officials and reports.
Most postings seen in Chinese Internet chatrooms blamed South Korea for seeking to provoke China and urged the Beijing government to punish the South, although some Web users called for calm.
Using an obscenity to describe South Koreans, one micro-blogger named Qiu Yang from Hunan Province accused Seoul of “flaunting powerful friends to bully others”.
“We must help the North Koreans to destroy the US-South Korean alliance,” Qiu wrote on popular Web portal sina.com.
Another Web user identified as Cai Xia from the northeast wrote: “The little Japanese didn’t dare to kill any of us in the ship collision near the Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台); how can the number two devil be so brash to do such a thing!”
“South Korea, the running dog of America, is seeking to provoke China — what are they thinking,” said another irate Internet user from Anhui Province.
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs refused to immediately comment on the incident when contacted by reporters.
Several state newspapers reported on the collision, many citing foreign media reports, and noted that South Korea had expressed regret over the dead and missing.
Four coast guard officers were injured as they tried to arrest the crew of the Chinese boat for illegal fishing in South Korean waters after the fishermen attacked the officers with metal bars, officials and reports said on Sunday.
Three fishermen have been held for questioning, a coastguard spokesman said yesterday.
“South Korea, again it is you bastards and this was not even in your fishing waters. You should mind your own ways. One day you will disappear from Asia,” a Chinese Web user from Sichuan Province said on sina.com.
Meanwhile, South Korea’s coast guard announced a new crackdown on illegal fishing in the Yellow Sea yesterday.
The three-day exercise involves 18 ships, two helicopters and about 200 personnel, a spokesman said.
“We are taking strong steps as illegal fishing by Chinese boats is rampant, despite our persistent crackdowns,” he said.
CROSS-STRAIT COLLABORATION: The new KMT chairwoman expressed interest in meeting the Chinese president from the start, but she’ll have to pay to get in Beijing allegedly agreed to let Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) around the Lunar New Year holiday next year on three conditions, including that the KMT block Taiwan’s arms purchases, a source said yesterday. Cheng has expressed interest in meeting Xi since she won the KMT’s chairmanship election in October. A source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a consensus on a meeting was allegedly reached after two KMT vice chairmen visited China’s Taiwan Affairs Office Director Song Tao (宋濤) in China last month. Beijing allegedly gave the KMT three conditions it had to
‘BALANCE OF POWER’: Hegseth said that the US did not want to ‘strangle’ China, but to ensure that none of Washington’s allies would be vulnerable to military aggression Washington has no intention of changing the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said on Saturday, adding that one of the US military’s main priorities is to deter China “through strength, not through confrontation.” Speaking at the annual Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California, Hegseth outlined the US Department of Defense’s priorities under US President Donald Trump. “First, defending the US homeland and our hemisphere. Second, deterring China through strength, not confrontation. Third, increased burden sharing for us, allies and partners. And fourth, supercharging the US defense industrial base,” he said. US-China relations under
The Chien Feng IV (勁蜂, Mighty Hornet) loitering munition is on track to enter flight tests next month in connection with potential adoption by Taiwanese and US armed forces, a government source said yesterday. The kamikaze drone, which boasts a range of 1,000km, debuted at the Taipei Aerospace and Defense Technology Exhibition in September, the official said on condition of anonymity. The Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology and US-based Kratos Defense jointly developed the platform by leveraging the engine and airframe of the latter’s MQM-178 Firejet target drone, they said. The uncrewed aerial vehicle is designed to utilize an artificial intelligence computer
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday decided to shelve proposed legislation that would give elected officials full control over their stipends, saying it would wait for a consensus to be reached before acting. KMT Legislator Chen Yu-jen (陳玉珍) last week proposed amendments to the Organic Act of the Legislative Yuan (立法院組織法) and the Regulations on Allowances for Elected Representatives and Subsidies for Village Chiefs (地方民意代表費用支給及村里長事務補助費補助條例), which would give legislators and councilors the freedom to use their allowances without providing invoices for reimbursement. The proposal immediately drew criticism, amid reports that several legislators face possible charges of embezzling fees intended to pay
RSS