Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

‘Australia would help US defend Taiwan’

Taipei Times

Australian Minister of Defence Peter Dutton speaks at a news conference at the HMAS Stirling Royal Australian Navy base in Perth, Australia, on Oct. 29.
Photo: EPA-EFE

It would be “inconceivable” for Australia not to join the US should Washington take action to defend Taiwan, Australian Minister of Defence Peter Dutton said yesterday.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday said that the US and its allies would take unspecified “action” if China were to use force to alter the “status quo” over Taiwan.

Checking education ties with China

Taipei Times Editorial

Minister of Education Pan Wen-chung (潘文忠) on Tuesday warned education providers to abide by the law when engaging in activities involving China.

Pan was responding to reports that National Tsing Hua University (NTHU) had hosted an office that recruited talent for China’s semiconductor industry.

NTHU on Monday said in a statement that the Cross-Strait Tsinghua Research Institute office was founded by an alumni group and denied any involvement in its operations.

Pan said that an investigation would be launched to determine whether other Taiwanese institutions had similar offices.

Referendum items are a KMT stunt

The Liberty Times Editorial

On Dec. 18, Taiwanese can vote on four referendum questions — whether they agree that a ban on pork imports containing traces of the feed additive ractopamine should be reinstated, whether a liquefied natural gas terminal project should be relocated to protect algal reefs off Taoyuan’s Guanyin District (觀音), whether referendums should be held alongside national elections and whether the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Gongliao District (貢寮) should resume.

The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is sharpening the knives, trying to persuade Taiwanese to vote “yes” on all four, with KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) saying that the referendums are an opportunity for a vote of no confidence in Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) and the government led by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

US summit should invite Taiwan

Huynh Tam Sang, Phan Van Tim

Taiwan, a steadfast soldier in the fight against authoritarianism, deserves a seat at the US-led virtual Summit for Democracy next month.

Rejuvenating global democracy has been the focus of US President Joe Biden’s foreign policy. His rhetoric on promoting democracy, known as the “Biden doctrine,” has as its core philosophy that contemporary democracies are in a competition to counter non-democratic regimes, such as Russia and China. Biden has pledged that the US would assemble a worldwide network of like-minded nations “to defend democracy globally, to push back authoritarianism’s advance.”

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