The drill is largely aimed at demonstrating humanitarian progress, as well as the coast guard’s ability to protect the nation’s fishermen.

Taiwan News
Date: 2016/11/11
By: Wendy Lee , Taiwan News, Staff Writer

Taiwan’s coast guard and navy are planning a drill on Taiping Island in the South China Sea, and it will mean more to the government this time than just to stir things up in the widely disputed area, an article published on Forbes said Thursday.

As this year marks the 70th anniversary of Taiping Island’s recovery by the ROC, Coast Guard Administration (CGA) under the Executive Yuan and the ROC Navy will conduct a joint humanitarian rescue drill in the South China Sea in late November.

President Tsai Ing-wen recently announced the nation’s plan to develop the Taiwan-controlled Taiping Island into a base for providing humanitarian aid and supplies, following a landmark judgement by an international tribunal in The Hague which ruled against China’s sovereignty claims over the South China Sea.

The court denied China’s legal basis to claim historical rights to resources in areas falling within the encompassing “nine-dash line,” and included seeing Taiping not as an island, but as a reef, undermining Taiwan’s claims in the region.    [FULL  STORY]