Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/05/11
By: Lu Hsin-hui and Lilian Wu

Taipei, May 11 (CNA) Taiwan is encountering frequent cyber attacks, with the scale reaching

the level of a “quasi war,” the Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC) said Wednesday, although other Cabinet officials said that the situation is under control.

The frequent attacks on Taiwan are some of the most serious in the world, mainly because “most of the cyber attacks come from the other side of the Taiwan Strait,” the ministry said in a report to a legislative committee.

A lot of hackers have infiltrated Taiwan’s key systems of national defense, diplomacy, utilities, air traffic control and telecommunications, with the scale and depth of the attacks reaching “the level of quasi war,” it said. It provided no evidence or details.

The ministry made the report to the Foreign and National Defense Committee, which had invited the ministry, as well as other related government agencies, to report on the necessity of forming a fourth military branch and the challenges posed by cyber attackers to the information security of the government and private sectors.     [FULL  STORY]

INAUGURATION:The speech would consist of three points: the significance of the third transfer of power, the predicaments facing Taiwan and cross-strait policies, a source said

Taipei Times
Date: May 12, 2016
By: Stacy Hsu / Staff reporter

President-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday declined to confirm a media report that the so-

called “1992 consensus” is to be omitted from her inauguration speech on Friday next week, which has been the subject of much rumor and speculation.

Citing an unidentified source in Tsai’s camp, the Chinese-language Next Magazine yesterday reported that despite Beijing’s repeated attempts to browbeat Tsai into taking a public stance on the “1992 consensus” and the “one China” principle, the president-elect has decided to mention neither in her inaugural speech as a way of responding to her mandate from the electorate.

“The problem with cross-strait issues does not lie in whether Tsai is willing to recognize the ‘1992 consensus’ or the ‘one China’ principle, but rather if these concepts are accepted by the majority of Taiwanese,” the source was quoted as saying.

“It is impossible for the new Democratic Progressive Party [DPP] government to fall in line simply because of Beijing’s intimidation,” the source said, urging China to realize that the DPP would not follow in the footsteps of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), a party that supports the “1992 consensus” and the “one China” principle, and which was voted out of office in January.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News
Date: 2016-05-11
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – President-elect Tsai Ing-wen will emphasize her defense of the status quo in cross-straits relations but stop one step short of accepting the “1992 Consensus,” reports said Wednesday.

With her swearing-in as president and her inauguration speech coming up on May 20, speculation has mounted as to what she will say about China. Beijing has even stated that her speech would influence Taiwan’s presence at the World Health Assembly in Geneva which opens on May 23.

China has kept harping on the need for Tsai to accept the “1992 Consensus,” an alleged agreement reached at a meeting between Taiwanese and Chinese delegations in Hong Kong in 1992. The outgoing Kuomintang government has said the formula means that there is only one China, but that each side can have its own interpretation of what that China means. Tsai and her Democratic Progressive Party have said there was no such consensus, since Beijing officials only mention the “One China” part of the formula, and not the phrase about separate interpretations.

In her inauguration speech, Tsai will not mention the “1992 Consensus” and “One China,” but she will acknowledge that there was a meeting with positive results in 1992, Chinese-language Next Magazine reported Wednesday.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/05/11
By: Yin Chun-chieh and Elizabeth Hsu

Beijing, May 11 (CNA) China will allow the family members of 45 Taiwanese fraud suspects

being detained in Beijing to visit their relatives beginning on May 15, according to China’s Taiwan Affairs Office.

Office spokesman Ma Xiaoguang (馬曉光) said Wednesday that the relevant Chinese authorities have received requests for visits from the suspects’ family members through the Taipei-based Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF).

The Chinese side will accept the visitors after May 15 “in accordance with the relevant Chinese regulations,” the official said, noting that China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) has already informed the SEF of the matter.

The SEF and ARATS are intermediary bodies founded to handle contacts and negotiations across the Taiwan Strait in the absence of official links.     [FOCUS  TAIWAN]

Taiwan News
Date: 2016-05-10
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – A decision not to demand a new environmental impact assessment report

for the contested Yoho Beach Resort and Club in Pingtung County was thrown out by a court in Kaohsiung Tuesday, handing a victory to local residents and activists.

The resort in the town of Hengchun’s popular Kenting area gained national notoriety in 2013, when the Environmental Protection Agency said the whole complex had been operating illegally for 11 years due to the absence of a proper environmental impact report.

The Pingtung County Government went on to “conditionally approve” an impact review and later ruled that no further second-phase report would be needed, as the resort posed no threat to the environment.

Environmental groups and local residents joined forces to demand those conclusions be rescinded, and their request was approved Tuesday by the High Administrative Court in Kaohsiung.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/05/10
B:y Elaine Hou and Emerson Lim

Taipei, May 10 (CNA) Taiwan looks forward to working with the new government of the Philippines to

deepen relations between the two countries based on the existing foundation, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Tuesday, as Rodrigo Duterte appeared to have won the Philippines’ presidential election.

Unofficial tallies had given Duterte, mayor of Davao, a big lead in the May 9 election. As the counting continued, the tough-talking mayor had garnered 38.6 percent of the votes, nearly 16 percentage points ahead of the next candidate in the five-person race.

The ministry said that Taiwan and the Philippines are geographically close to each other and maintain close exchanges in trade, investment and tourism.

Taiwan “hopes to work with the new government to continue cooperation and deepen bilateral relations, based on the existing foundation,” the ministry said.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Today
Date: May 10, 2016

Taiwan’s Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi Foundation held May 8 a series of ceremonies

worldwide celebrating Buddha’s birthday in conjunction with Mother’s Day on the second Sunday of May, enabling believers to express gratitude for Buddha, parents and all sentient beings.

In the face of natural disasters around the globe—especially this year’s earthquakes in southern Taiwan’s Tainan City, Japan’s Kumamoto prefecture and Kyushu Island, as well as South American nation Ecuador—Prayer, Gratitude was selected as the theme of the ceremonies. A total of 450 sessions were attended by an estimated 270,000 worshippers in 35 countries and territories.

The first, led by founder Dharma Master Cheng Yen, took place early in the morning at Tzu Chi headquarters in eastern Taiwan’s Hualien County. Among other venues hosting ceremonies was Liberty Square, the plaza abutting National Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei City’s Zhongzheng District—home to the Office of the President, Republic of China (Taiwan), and numerous central government ministries.

President Ma Ying-jeou, Vice President Wu Den-yih and Legislative Yuan President Su Jia-chyuan were some of the many high-profile attendees at the event. In remarks made April 30 by Ma at Tzu Chi’s 50th anniversary celebrations in Hualien, Ma praised the group’s half century of selfless, consistent devotions to Taiwan society and the international community.     [FULL  STORY]

LATE CHARM OFFENSIVE:The president finally decided to accept the resignation of the Academia Sinica president after considering public opinion, a statement said

Taipei Times
Date: May 11, 2016
By: Chen Wei-han / Staff reporter

President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday approved the resignation of Academia Sinica President Wong Chi-huey (翁啟惠), amid an ongoing investigation into Wong’s role in an insider trading scandal involving biotech company OBI Pharma Inc (台灣浩鼎).

Wong offered his resignation on March 29 when traveling in the US, but Ma did not accept it at the time and demanded instead that Wong return to Taiwan to respond to the allegations.

Allegations of improper conduct began after Wong endorsed a new OBI Pharma cancer drug, despite discouraging clinical trial results in February, and it emerged shortly afterward that his daughter is a major shareholder in the company.

It also emerged that Wong, on behalf of his daughter, sold 10,000 of the firm’s shares before the trial results were publicly released.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/05/09
By: Chen Wei-ting, Tai Ya-chen, Claudia Liu and Evelyn Kao

Taipei, May 9 (CNA) The Ministry of Health and Welfare said Monday it has confirmed in a letter to

the World Health Organization (WHO) that Taiwan will participate in the upcoming World Health Assembly (WHA) in Geneva as an observer.

The ministry said Taiwan’s Health Minister-designate Lin Tsou-yen (林奏延) will attend the meeting, stressing that Taiwan’s absence from the WHA would not only hurt the health rights of Taiwan’s people but also represent a loss for the world.

It described Taiwan in the letter as an active participant in the WHA that can contribute greatly to the world’s leading health organization given its experience and abilities in the medical and health care area.

The ministry was replying to an invitation from the WHO to Minister of Health and Welfare Chiang Been-huang (蔣丙煌) dated May 6, in which WHO Director-General Margaret Chan invited him to attend the May 23-28 meeting in Geneva.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Today
Date: May 9, 2016

Taiwan joined the global high-capacity container ship club May 5 following the launch of two

domestically developed and constructed vessels by state-backed shipbuilder CSBC Corporation, Taiwan, in the southern Taiwan port city of Kaohsiung.

The YM Window and YM Width are 368 meters long, 51 meters wide and can carry 14,198, 20-foot equivalent units (TEUs) of containers. A 40-foot container—the most commonly used size—is around two TEUs.

CSBC Chairman Lai Sun-quae said the vessels are a significant step up from the company’s last batch of 10 container ships produced from 2011 to 2015 that could carry around 8,000 TEUs.

“Window and Width are quieter and more economical,” Lai said. “They are also easier to operate and boast a faster cruising speed of 23.3 nautical miles per hour, a number on par with rival vessels produced in South Korea.”

The improved performance of the ships will help ensure they do not fall prey to pirates off the coast of Somalia as was the case with Maersk Alabama, a vessel of around 1,000 TEUs constructed by CSBC in 1998. “Not many people know that it was our ship depicted in the 2013 box office hit ‘Captain Phillips’ starring Tom Hanks,” Lai said.     [FULL  STORY]