Minister of Digital Affairs Audrey Tang (唐鳳) yesterday delivered an unannounced video message at a US-backed democracy summit in Seoul.
Tang told the third Summit for Democracy that Taiwan has suffered disproportionately from concerted cyberattacks and that the nation was willing and able to work with all stakeholders to ensure artificial intelligence (AI) develops safely and sustainably.
Taiwan is a key global supplier of the semiconductor chips critical for such technology applications.
Photo: screen grab from the Ministry of Digital Affairs’ YouTube channel
The conference being hosted by South Korea is an initiative of US President Joe Biden aimed at finding ways to stop democratic backsliding and the erosion of rights and freedoms.
China said it was firmly opposed to South Korea having invited Taiwan to participate.
“There is only one China in the world,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Lin Jian (林劍) told a regular news conference in Beijing yesterday. “Taiwan is an inalienable part of Chinese territory.”
He urged Seoul to abide by the “one China” principle and stop providing a platform for Taiwanese independence forces to boost their prestige.
The South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not immediately respond when asked about Lin’s comments.
South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol has charted a course closer to the US, but China is South Korea’s largest trading partner, and Yoon has also tried to placate Beijing to avoid widespread economic blowback.
Tang’s participation in the event was not announced in advance by authorities in Taiwan or South Korea.
A session program distributed yesterday listed only a possible video message in fine print at the end, while Tang’s ministry did not flag the appearance in her daily schedule of public events given to reporters.
Tang’s comments were made in a pre-recorded video message, Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
The South Korean announcer who introduced Tang’s video said she was appearing in a private capacity as an expert on the issues.
A democratic, rather than technocratic approach, is ideal to tackle the challenges of AI, such as by mobilizing citizens to identify and counter misinformation, Tang told the gathering.
Tang’s invitation to Biden’s first democracy summit in 2021 also drew protest from China, while US officials cut short the video feed of her remarks after a map in her slide presentation depicted Taiwan in a color different from that of China.
Foreign tourists who purchase a seven-day Taiwan Pass are to get a second one free of charge as part of a government bid to boost tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. A pair of Taiwan Passes is priced at NT$5,000 (US$156.44), an agency staff member said, adding that the passes can be used separately. The pass can be used in many of Taiwan’s major cities and to travel to several tourist resorts. It expires seven days after it is first used. The pass is a three-in-one package covering the high-speed rail system, mass rapid transport (MRT) services and the Taiwan Tourist Shuttle services,
Drinking a lot of water or milk would not help a person who has ingested terbufos, a toxic chemical that has been identified as the likely cause of three deaths, a health expert said yesterday. An 83-year-old woman surnamed Tseng (曾) and two others died this week after eating millet dumplings with snails that Tseng had made. Tseng died on Tuesday and others ate the leftovers when they went to her home to mourn her death that evening. Twelve people became ill after eating the dumplings following Tseng’s death. Their symptoms included vomiting and convulsions. Six were hospitalized, with two of them
DIVA-READY: The city’s deadline for the repairs is one day before pop star Jody Chiang is to perform at the Taipei Dome for the city’s Double Ten National Day celebrations The Taipei City Government has asked Farglory Group (遠雄集團) to repair serious water leaks in the Taipei Dome before Friday next week, Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) said yesterday, following complaints that many areas at the stadium were leaking during two baseball games over the weekend. The dome on Saturday and Sunday hosted two games in tribute to CTBC Brothers’ star Chou Szu-chi (周思齊) ahead of his retirement from the CPBL. The games each attracted about 40,000 people, filling the stadium to capacity. However, amid heavy rain, many people reported water leaking on some seats, at the entrance and exit areas, and the
BIG collection: The herbarium holds more than 560,000 specimens, from the Japanese colonial period to the present, including the Wulai azalea, which is now extinct in the wild The largest collection of plant specimens in Taiwan, the Taipei Botanical Garden’s herbarium, is celebrating its 100th anniversary with an exhibition that opened on Friday. The herbarium provides critical historical documents for botanists and is the first of its kind in Taiwan, Taiwan Forestry Research Institute director Tseng Yen-hsueh (曾彥學) said. It is housed in a two-story red brick building, which opened during 1924. At the time, it stored 30,000 plant specimens from almost 6,000 species, including Taiwanese plant samples collected by Tomitaro Makino, the “father of Japanese botany,” Tseng said. The herbarium collection has grown in the century since its