Test was conducted last year off Pingtung County

Taiwan News
Date: 2019/06/07
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – The Hsiung Feng III missile only needs 71 seconds to destroy a target at a distance of 47 kilometers, Taiwan’s military news agency said Friday (June 7).

The result was achieved during a live-fire drill last July 16 off the coast of the Jiupeng base in Pingtung County, the Central News Agency reported.

The Navy sent its Tian Dan Cheng Kung-class guided-missile frigate to the area in June 2018 to prepare for the exercise. At 7:10 a.m., the ship fired off the missile, and at 7:11:11, the target was reported destroyed.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2019/06/07
By: Elane Hou, Hsiao Po-wen and Frances Huang

Taipei, June 7 (CNA) The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said Friday that it will work

with the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) to study the possibility of appealing a ruling by the high court in the U.K. a day earlier denying an application by Taiwan for the extradition of British fugitive Zain Dean.

On June 6, the Scottish High Court of Judiciary ruled in a 2-1 vote that Dean cannot be extradited to Taiwan to serve a sentence.

MOFA expressed regret over the ruling, saying that while it will consult with the MOJ, it will also ask its representative office in the U.K. to contact prosecutors in Scotland to determine what further action can be taken.

Dean was convicted and sentenced to four years in prison by the Taiwan High Court in July 2012 after being found guilty in a March 2010 hit and run incident in which newspaper deliveryman, Huang Chun-teh (黃俊德) died.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International 
Date: 06 June, 2019
By: John Van Trieste

The foreign ministry says Taiwan’s diplomatic ties with the Solomon Islands are stable and continue to grow. That’s despite reports that the Pacific island nation will soon decide whether to cut ties with Taiwan and recognize Beijing.

The country is reportedly set to make a decision within 100 days.    [FULL  STORY]

South China Morning Post
Date: 7 Jun, 2019 
By: Mark Magnier  

• The wording is an apparent break with Washington’s long-standing adherence to a one-China principle
• The acting US defence secretary, in the report’s introduction, identifies the Chinese Communist Party as the architect of a vision for ‘repressive world order’

There has been growing bipartisan support in Washington for a harder line toward China and improved ties with Taiwan. Photo: EPA

The Trump administration’s move to include Taiwan on a list of “countries” in a US defence department report is the latest in a series of provocative moves that appear aimed at confronting China, and putting it on notice.

The wording, an apparent break with long-standing US adherence to a one-China principle, is contained in the 55-page “Indo-Pacific Strategy Report” released on Saturday. The language is part of a section detailing US efforts to strengthen partnerships with democracies in the region; the section cites Singapore, Taiwan, New Zealand and Mongolia.

“All four countries contribute to US missions around the world and are actively taking steps to uphold a free and open international order,” the report says, citing the four “countries” as “reliable, capable and natural partners”.

The defence department did not respond to questions about its use of language, any intended purpose or message, although a senior Pentagon official said on Thursday that Taiwan was under growing threat from Beijing.    [FULL  STORY]

Chairman of Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation criticizes changes to primary procedure

Taiwan News
Date: 2019/06/07
By:  Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Referencing the 1978 movie “The Deer Hunter,” Chairman of the Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation You Ying-lung (游盈隆) said on his Facebook page the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) presidential primary, scheduled to take place from Monday (June 10) through Friday (June 14), is like “Russian roulette.”

You wrote: “The presidential primary has become a horrific game of Russian roulette that makes the poll results highly uncertain.”

The primary is the first in the world to include cellphone users’ votes. You believes, however, that it is a campaign trick orchestrated by the incumbent Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) to secure a primary win.

You said landline polling is more stable, cheaper and more accountable than cellphone polling.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2019/06/07
By: Wang Shu-fen and Frances Huang 

Taipei, June 7 (CNA) Sunny skies are forecast to prevail Friday, with the mercury in Taipei and New Taipei soaring to a level that triggered a high temperature warning, according to the Central Weather Bureau (CWB).

The CWB issued a “yellow” temperature alert for the two cities, which indicates temperatures of over 36 degrees Celsius on a single day based on the bureau’s color-coded warning system.

The high temperatures, which will peak around noon, are caused by a lingering Pacific high pressure system, the CWB said.

In central and southern Taiwan, daytime highs of 34-35 degrees can be expected Friday, with a possibility of 36 degrees or higher in Dawu Township in Taitung County, the CWB said.    [FULL  STORY]

LEGISLATION: The nation needs a climate change act to integrate climate action across different sectors, as its greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, the paper said

Taipei Times
Date: Jun 07, 2019
By: Lin Chia-nan  /  Staff Reporter

Academia Sinica yesterday released a white paper urging authorities to adopt more drastic

plans to curb greenhouse gas emissions and draft climate change legislation.

The drafting of the white paper, “Taiwan Deep Decarbonization Policy,” started in 2015 and took more than three years to finish, as it involves many fields, including energy-related techniques, economic development and social communication, said Wang Pao-kuan (王寶貫), director of Academia Sinica’s Research Center for Environmental Changes and lead author of the report.

Taiwan’s greenhouse gas emissions in 2015 reached 284.643 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent, up from 137.854 million tonnes in 1990, the paper says.

In 2015, carbon dioxide made up about 95.21 percent of the nation’s total greenhouse gas emissions, followed by methane (1.91 percent), nitrous oxide (1.58 percent) and hydrofluorocarbons (1.3 percent), it says.    [FULL  STORY]

Radio Taiwan International 
Date: 05 June, 2019
By: Shirley Lin

The Taiwan International Balloon Festival will kick off June 29 at the Luye Highland in Taitung County. This year’s theme is “children’s dream park”. In addition to the Tourism Bureau’s mascot Oh Bear, there will be hot air balloons shaped like a range of cartoon characters and animals. As many as 40 hot air balloons from around the world will be there.

There will also be nine light sculpture music shows every weekend to mark the festival’s ninth anniversary. One of them will be the first such show to take place on Green Island, off the coast of Taitung.

On opening day, a group of children from the indigenous Bunun people will perform a dance to kick off the festival. The event ends on August 12.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan Today
Date: June 05, 2019

MOFA Deputy Minister Hsu Szu-chien (third right), Minister without Portfolio Audrey Tang (fourth left) and AIT Director Brent Christensen (fourth right) give the thumbs-up to the future course of Taiwan-U.S. relations at a public forum June 3 in Taipei City. (CNA)
A public forum on charting the future course of Taiwan-U.S. relations was co-staged by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and American Institute in Taiwan June 3 in Taipei City.

Moderated by Minister without Portfolio Audrey Tang, the event reviewed the results of AIT’s groundbreaking Digital Dialogues. It is seen as another example of close cooperation between Taipei and Washington in the 40th year of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA40).

During the opening ceremony, MOFA Deputy Minister Hsu Szu-chien said it is critical for governments around the world to reach out to citizens in ways capitalizing on internet freedom and emerging technologies like artificial intelligence.

The Digital Dialogues are an invaluable platform for giving voice to fresh ideas on Taiwan-U.S. ties and strengthening participatory democracy, Hsu added.    [FULL  STORY]