Radio Taiwan Internatinal
Date: 06 January, 2020
By: Natalie Tso

The Marshall Islands has elected David Kabua as its new president on Monday.

Taiwan’s ambassador to the Pacific nation, Jeffrey S. C. Hsiao, congratulated Kabua in person on behalf of Taiwan. Kabua said he will support diplomatic ties between the Marshall Islands and Taiwan. He also praised the way Taiwan has helped his country. He said that his administration will continue to work closely with Taiwan and to strengthen the friendship and cooperation between the two sides.

Deputy Foreign Minister Hsu Szu-chien will lead a delegation to the Marshall Islands to meet and congratulate the new president and his administration.    [FULL  STORY]

The self-governing island is on high alert for digital-age trickery and deception that Beijing might be using to try to swing a crucial election.

The New York Times
Date: Jan. 6, 2020
By: Raymond Zhong

TAIPEI, Taiwan — At first glance, the bespectacled YouTuber railing against Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, just seems like a concerned citizen making an appeal to his fellow Taiwanese.

He speaks Taiwanese-accented Mandarin, with the occasional phrase in Taiwanese dialect. His captions are written with the traditional Chinese characters used in Taiwan, not the simplified ones used in China. With outrage in his voice, he accuses Ms. Tsai of selling out “our beloved land of Taiwan” to Japan and the United States.

The man, Zhang Xida, does not say in his videos whom he works for. But other websites and videos make it clear: He is a host for China National Radio, the Beijing-run broadcaster.

As Taiwan gears up for a major election this week, officials and researchers worry that China is experimenting with social media manipulation to sway the vote. Doing so would be easy, they fear, in the island’s rowdy democracy, where the news cycle is fast and voters are already awash in false or highly partisan information.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Transportation Safety Board denies suggesting human error as possible cause of incident

Taiwan News
Date: 2020/01/06
By: Huang Tzu-ti, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taiwan’s military is reportedly upset about the leak of flight recorder data from the UH-60M Black Hawk helicopter that crashed on Jan. 2, killing eight military officers.

Reports suggest that the decision by the Taiwan Transportation Safety Board (TTSB) to provide a preliminary analysis of the cause of the fatal incident has raised the ire of Ministry of National Defense (MND) officials. The ministry even reportedly vowed legal action against the individuals who were responsible for leaking the information to the public, wrote Liberty Times.

Citing the TTSB, CNA reported on Saturday (Jan. 4) that mechanical failure and turbulence could be 80 percent ruled out as the cause of last week's accident. The agency was scheduled to hand over the relevant information to the defense ministry that afternoon.

TTSB Chairperson Young Hong-tsu (楊宏智) repudiated the rumor, saying the independent investigation agency has received no such complaint from the military. The MND has also denied commenting on the matter, LTN quoted Young as saying.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 01/06/2020
By: Chang Ming-hsuan and Elizabeth Hsu

Taipei, Jan. 6 (CNA) People in Taiwan can now decide in advance under the Patient Right to Autonomy Act to not have their lives prolonged if they have any one of 11 rare diseases, the Ministry of Health and Welfare (MOHW) said in a statement Monday.

The Act, the first of its kind in Asia, allowed people the right to decide in advance to have a doctor terminate or withhold life-sustaining treatments, nutrition and hydration if they are terminally ill, in an irreversible coma, in a permanent vegetative state, or suffering from severe dementia.

It also applied to people with other diseases considered "unbearable" and "incurable" that do not have any other treatment options.

Now, however, doctors will also be able to follow the same advance instructions for patients with any of the 11 rare diseases listed Monday, including multiple system atrophy (MSA), Duchenne muscular dystrophy, and hereditary epidermolysis bullosa.    [FULL  STORY]

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 07, 2020
By: Staff writer, with CNA

Since fines for bringing in pork products from countries affected by African swine fever were increased

on Dec. 18, 2018, the government has fined inbound travelers about US$4.5 million.

As of Sunday last week, 678 people had been fined the increased penalty of NT$200,000 (US$6,642) for contravening the ban, figures from the Central Emergency Operation Center for African Swine Fever showed.

The pork products came mainly from China (589 cases), Vietnam (56 cases), South Korea (21 cases) and the Philippines (12 cases), the center said.

Of the 678 perpetrators, 354 were Chinese and 233 were Taiwanese. Among the others fined were 32 Vietnamese, 12 Koreans and 11 Filipinos.    [FULL  STORY]

Taipei raises penalties for spread of misinformation as civil groups act to help voters fact-check political messages

The Straits Times
Date: Jan 5, 2020
By: Katherine Wei

With a presidential election just a week away, Taiwan's government, the local media, researchers and hackers are stepping up efforts to quash a deluge of fake news – much of which is believed to be coming from China.

On New Year's Eve, Taiwan's legislature passed a number of amendments to the Criminal Code to regulate the spreading of misinformation, raising the penalty from about two years behind bars and a fine of NT$1,000 (S$45) to up to NT$200,000 in fines and the same prison time. The punishment is heavier if the misinformation is spread online or via television, radio or other media.

The problem of fake news is considered especially acute in the island. Along with Latvia, Taiwan was ranked as the place most affected by foreign online disinformation campaigns in the world in 2019 by the V-Dem Institute, a data analysis centre hosted at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden's Department of Political Science.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2020/01/05
By: Chang Ming-hsuan and Chiang Yi-ching

Taipei, Jan. 5 (CNA) Taiwan's Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said Sunday that it has expanded the conditions for notification of suspected cases of an unconfirmed respiratory virus.

The move is the latest preventive measure the CDC has taken against a cluster of respiratory infections that have been reported in the Chinese city of Wuhan.

Doctors and airport quarantine officials must notify the CDC when they encounter a patient who has traveled to Wuhan in the past 14 days and presents with a fever and symptoms of upper respiratory tract infection.

Previously, they only had to notify the CDC if a patient met one of two requirements; either the patient had a fever, symptoms of pneumonia and had traveled to Wuhan, or they had a fever, symptoms of upper respiratory tract infection and had been to the Huanan Seafood Market, where a number of those infected in Wuhan reportedly worked as vendors.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Insight
Date: 5 January 2020
By: Jens Damm.

A common criticism in Taiwan and among journalists is the lack of international media coverage of Taiwan. Thus, the fact that Taiwan made headlines internationally when it became the first in Asia to legalise same-sex marriage should be a boost for President Tsai Ing-wen, who was an outspoken supporter of the legislation. However, since Taiwan’s highest court ruled in 2017 to give the Legislative Yuan two years to pass legislation legalising same-sex marriage, it seemed that Taiwan’s international recognition for progressing in gender rights was domestically counterproductive. Tsai, who had already been criticised for being an unmarried female head of state, was increasingly attacked by conservative ‘green camp’ supporters and even members of her own party. Some critics within the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) exited and established the Formosa Alliance, a party advocating both Taiwan independence and a socially conservative agenda.

After the “victory of LGBTQ” in 2017 a fierce opposition emerged, heavily supported by an US-financed, international evangelical Christian network. This opposition was most evident in the 2018 referenda: despite some opinion polls showing equal support both for and against same-sex marriage, the referenda proved to be a nightmare for activists and Tsai. Questions such as “Do you agree that Civil Code regulations should restrict marriage to being between a man and a woman?” and “Do you agree that the Ministry of Education should not implement the Enforcement Rules for Gender Equity Education Act in elementary and middle schools?” received widespread support. Same-sex marriage was nevertheless legalised, as the Court’s decision overruled the referenda result. There were two exceptions, however, provided for in adoption rights and the restriction of same-sex marriage in binational couples. Same-sex couples can only be married in Taiwan if the spouse also comes from a country which recognises same-sex marriage.

Same-Sex Marriage – the diffusion of a Western development to Taiwan

From the late 1980s Denmark, the Netherlands and Belgium allowed same-sex registered partnerships and gradually began to open marriage for same-sex couples. These countries were followed in the early 2000s by South Africa, other European countries, the Americas, Australia and New Zealand. In most cases, parliaments acted after long struggles by social movements and ‘gay friendly’ political parties. In a few cases, such as Ireland, same-sex marriage was legalised by referendum. Slovenia was a contrary case where a parliamentary proposal for marriage was rejected by referendum. In general, however, social acceptance went along with legislation.   [FULL  STORY]