Japan indicated yesterday that it would not rush to resume imports of US beef until assessing concerns about mad cow disease amid intense US pressure ahead of a visit by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
"We cannot say when at the moment" Japan will lift the ban, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda, the government spokesman, told a news conference.
He emphasized that Japan had already accepted a key US demand by agreeing not to test every cow to be slaughtered.
The stumbling point is how to test the cows' ages, with Japan saying there is not enough evidence to go ahead with methodology proposed by the US.
"The US proposals came after we reached a scientific conclusion in Japan that cows younger than 20 months old can be exempted from all-out checks," Hosoda said.
Japan used to be the biggest foreign market for US beef but shut off the multibillion-dollar trade in December 2003 after a cow slaughtered in Washington state was found to have bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) or mad cow disease, linked to a fatal brain condition in humans.
Members of the US Congress from farm states have called for trade sanctions against Japan unless it resumes buying US beef soon.
US President George W. Bush personally urged Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, one of his key international allies, to lift the ban in a telephone call last Wednesday, a message Rice is expected to emphasize in meetings in Tokyo on Saturday.
Yasufumi Tanahashi, the state minister overseeing food safety, said the government would "watch independent debate" at the experts' panel on beef, suggesting Tokyo would not put political pressure on it before Rice's visit.
A Chinese freighter that allegedly snapped an undersea cable linking Taiwan proper to Penghu County is suspected of being owned by a Chinese state-run company and had docked at the ports of Kaohsiung and Keelung for three months using different names. On Tuesday last week, the Togo-flagged freighter Hong Tai 58 (宏泰58號) and its Chinese crew were detained after the Taipei-Penghu No. 3 submarine cable was severed. When the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) first attempted to detain the ship on grounds of possible sabotage, its crew said the ship’s name was Hong Tai 168, although the Automatic Identification System (AIS)
An Akizuki-class destroyer last month made the first-ever solo transit of a Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ship through the Taiwan Strait, Japanese government officials with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. The JS Akizuki carried out a north-to-south transit through the Taiwan Strait on Feb. 5 as it sailed to the South China Sea to participate in a joint exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces that day. The Japanese destroyer JS Sazanami in September last year made the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force’s first-ever transit through the Taiwan Strait, but it was joined by vessels from New Zealand and Australia,
CHANGE OF MIND: The Chinese crew at first showed a willingness to cooperate, but later regretted that when the ship arrived at the port and refused to enter Togolese Republic-registered Chinese freighter Hong Tai (宏泰號) and its crew have been detained on suspicion of deliberately damaging a submarine cable connecting Taiwan proper and Penghu County, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement yesterday. The case would be subject to a “national security-level investigation” by the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, it added. The administration said that it had been monitoring the ship since 7:10pm on Saturday when it appeared to be loitering in waters about 6 nautical miles (11km) northwest of Tainan’s Chiang Chun Fishing Port, adding that the ship’s location was about 0.5 nautical miles north of the No.
SECURITY: The purpose for giving Hong Kong and Macau residents more lenient paths to permanent residency no longer applies due to China’s policies, a source said The government is considering removing an optional path to citizenship for residents from Hong Kong and Macau, and lengthening the terms for permanent residence eligibility, a source said yesterday. In a bid to prevent the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from infiltrating Taiwan through immigration from Hong Kong and Macau, the government could amend immigration laws for residents of the territories who currently receive preferential treatment, an official familiar with the matter speaking on condition of anonymity said. The move was part of “national security-related legislative reform,” they added. Under the amendments, arrivals from the Chinese territories would have to reside in Taiwan for
RSS