The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has stopped referring to Taiwan as “Chinese Taipei” in official documents in response to a complaint from the Washington-based Formosan Association for Public Affairs (FAPA).
The complaint was lodged following the earthquake in Chile about six weeks ago when there were fears that a resulting tsunami could reach Taiwan.
At the time, the NOAA issued a tsunami alert in which it referred to Taiwan as Chinese Taipei.
In a letter to the NOAA — an agency affiliated with the US Department of Commerce — FAPA president Bob Yang (楊英育) said that it was an “incontestable reality that Taiwan is not a part of China.”
He said that in 1996 the US State Department issued a memorandum saying that since the US had no diplomatic relations with the Republic of China, US officials should refer to the country as “Taiwan.”
At a later date, William Burns, executive secretary of the State Department at the time, ruled that “consistent with the unofficial nature of US-Taiwan ties, we refer to Taiwan simply as Taiwan.”
Yang told NOAA that it was “of concern to my members” that the organization was referring to Taiwan as Chinese Taipei.
“I respectfully request that NOAA adopt the long-established US State Department guidelines consistent with US national policies and correct this factual error,” wrote Yang.
In response, Dan Thompson, director of international activities at NOAA, said that after consulting with the American Institute in Taiwan, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center had “corrected” its database and that in future it would refer to Taiwan by its proper name — Taiwan.
“We are pleased with the outcome,” a FAPA official said.
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
Another wave of cold air would affect Taiwan starting from Friday and could evolve into a continental cold mass, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Temperatures could drop below 10°C across Taiwan on Monday and Tuesday next week, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. Seasonal northeasterly winds could bring rain, he said. Meanwhile, due to the continental cold mass and radiative cooling, it would be cold in northern and northeastern Taiwan today and tomorrow, according to the CWA. From last night to this morning, temperatures could drop below 10°C in northern Taiwan, it said. A thin coat of snow
RSS