Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Japan urges global action against Chinese air zone

Taipei Times

Japanese Minister of Defense Itsunori Onodera yesterday called on the international community to oppose China’s recently declared maritime air defense zone over the East China Sea and possibly over the disputed South China Sea.

Onodera discussed Tokyo’s concern over Beijing’s action separately with Philippine Secretary of Defense Voltaire Gazmin and Australian Minister of Foreign Affairs Julia Bishop.

KMT serves to obscure national sovereignty

Wei Hung-wu 韋洪武

The symbols of Taiwan’s national sovereignty — the national flag, emblem and anthem — have long since disappeared from international sport contests, academic conferences and international organizations under pressure from China. The country’s name is often left off the list of options for online registration. The Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) belong to Toucheng Township (頭城) in Yilan County, yet the nation is incapable of protecting them. Now even the air defense identification zone and the Taipei Flight Information Region are being intruded upon by those of China and Japan.

What is the national identity, and what is the nature of the relationship with the other side of the Taiwan Strait? Under President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) administration, these questions have become mired in confusion.

Ministry keeps mum on Taiwan’s status at expo

Taipei Times

The Taiwan pavilion at the 2010 Shanghai World Expo is pictured on Apr. 25, 2010. Photo: CNA

The organizer of the 2015 World Exposition in Milan is reportedly only willing to place the Taiwan Pavilion in the “corporate area” rather than in the “country area,” a matter on which the Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday declined to comment, citing insufficient information.

Following its participation in the World Exposition held in Japan’s Osaka in 1970, Taiwan, due to interference by China, has not participated in any of the subsequent world expos until Expo 2010 in China’s Shanghai. The Bureau of Shanghai World Expo Coordination sent an official invitation to the Taipei World Trade Center organization for a Taiwan Pavilion at the expo in May 2009.

Declaration lacks legal power

Coen Blaauw

I was intrigued by the article about a conference on Sunday to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Cairo Declaration (“Declaration ‘intended to return Taiwan to ROC,’” Dec. 2, page 1).

“It is a ‘very big mistake’ to think that the Cairo Declaration was only a press communique. Both the US and Japan have included the Cairo Declaration, the 1945 Potsdam Declaration and the 1945 Japanese Instrument of Surrender in their official collection of treaties,” President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said at the conference in Taipei, adding that all three documents are legally binding.

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