New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜), the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) presidential candidate, yesterday said he supports maintaining close relations with the US while keeping a peaceful relationship with China, adding that President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) foreign policy has cost the country multiple allies and made it unable to join regional economic organizations.
Hou and his running mate, Jaw Shaw-kong (趙少康), at a news conference in New Taipei City also vowed to impose tougher sanctions on scammers.
Asked on the sidelines to comment on Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) Chairman and candidate Ko Wen-je’s (柯文哲) plan to follow Tsai’s foreign policy, Hou said that he opposes China’s “one country, two systems” policy and would defend Taiwan’s freedom, democracy and sovereignty, but would not support independence.
Photo: Tu Chien-jung, Taipei Times
“My position is that we should maintain close relations with the US while keeping a peaceful relationship with China. We should remain a strong ally to the US, but we also need to communicate and increase mutual understanding with China,” Hou said.
“The balance of cross-strait relations has been disrupted because of the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) foreign policy. People now fear an imminent war,” he added, calling Tsai’s foreign policy a “complete failure.”
“In the past seven years, Taiwan has lost multiple allies. There is no communication, no dialogue and no exchanges between Taiwan and China, either,” Hou said.
“Because of the DPP government’s error, we cannot join the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership or the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. This shows that the nation needs an adjustment in the direction of foreign policy, because what Tsai has done clearly did not work,” he said.
Facing the military threat from China, Taiwan must not harbor any impractical thoughts, he said.
“The safety of Taiwan does not depend solely on the promises made by the US. We must have a practical view of our relations with China and democratic allies,” he added.
During the news conference, Hou vowed to launch a massive crackdown on scammers during the first year of his presidency if elected, and to reduce scam cases by half by his third year.
A rise in scams has also contributed to an increase in other organized criminal activity, including drug trafficking, he said.
The DPP government has spent NT$2.7 billion (US$85.6 million) cracking down on scams, but cases continue to rise from about 20,000 last year to 30,000 this year, Hou said.
About 46,000 suspects were arrested last year alone for alleged involvement in scams, he added.
Hou touted his record of reducing violent criminal cases when he headed the National Police Agency, first by extensively investigating vehicle thefts.
Hou attributed the continual rise in scam cases to light sentencing and a lack of coordination among government agencies.
Once convicted, only about 0.5 percent of scammers are sentenced to three years in prison or longer, even if the money involved was in the billions, he said.
“If elected, I propose that individuals or organizations participating in scams will be subject to criminal liability, under which penalties should be raised 50 percent. The same penalty would apply to those who repeatedly let scammers use their bank accounts for money-laundering purposes,” he said.
A decision to describe a Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement on Singapore’s Taiwan policy as “erroneous” was made because the city-state has its own “one China policy” and has not followed Beijing’s “one China principle,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Chung-kwang (田中光) said yesterday. It has been a longstanding practice for the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to speak on other countries’ behalf concerning Taiwan, Tien said. The latest example was a statement issued by the PRC after a meeting between Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on the sidelines of the APEC summit
Taiwan’s passport ranked 34th in the world, with access to 141 visa-free destinations, according to the latest update to the Henley Passport Index released today. The index put together by Henley & Partners ranks 199 passports globally based on the number of destinations holders can access without a visa out of 227, and is updated monthly. The 141 visa-free destinations for Taiwanese passport holders are a slight decrease from last year, when holders had access to 145 destinations. Botswana and Columbia are among the countries that have recently ended visa-free status for Taiwanese after “bowing to pressure from the Chinese government,” the Ministry
HEALTHCARE: Following a 2022 Constitutional Court ruling, Taiwanese traveling overseas for six months would no longer be able to suspend their insurance Measures allowing people to suspend National Health Insurance (NHI) services if they plan to leave the country for six months would be abolished starting Dec. 23, NHIA Director-General Shih Chung-liang (石崇良) said yesterday. The decision followed the Constitutional Court’s ruling in 2022 that the regulation was unconstitutional and that it would invalidate the regulation automatically unless the NHIA amended it to conform with the Constitution. The agency would amend the regulations to remove the articles and sections that allow the suspension of NHI services, and also introduce provisional clauses for those who suspended their NHI services before Dec. 23, Shih said. According to
‘GRAY ZONE’ TACTICS: China continues to build up its military capacity while regularly deploying jets and warships around Taiwan, with the latest balloon spotted on Sunday The US is drawing up contingency plans for military deployments in Japan and the Philippines in case of a Taiwan emergency, Japan’s Kyodo news agency reported. They would be incorporated in a first joint operation plan to be formulated in December, Kyodo reported late on Sunday, citing sources familiar with Japan-US relations. A US Marine Corps regiment that possesses High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems — a light multiple rocket launcher — would be deployed along the Nansei Island chain stretching from Kyushu to Yonaguni near Taiwan, Kyodo said. According to US military guidelines for dispatching marines in small formations to several locations,
RSS