Category Archives: Taiwan

My year in Taiwan shows the virus will exploit any hint of complacency

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I’ve had an almost pandemic-free existence reporting from the island, but it hasn’t all been a smooth ride

For much of this year, I’ve lived a mostly Covid-free life. Taiwan wasn’t just lucky. It had been traumatised by Sars, which it didn’t handle well, and established comprehensive epidemic plans for the next time. There was no talk of herd immunity or accepting mass deaths as inevitable. As far as Taiwan was concerned, Covid-19 wasn’t getting in, and if it tried they were ready.

Taiwan took full advantage of being an island to quarantine itself from the world. It funnelled entrants through a tightly controlled system defined by extreme caution.

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Australians fear attack from China almost as much as Taiwanese do, survey finds

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More than four in 10 Australians think Chinese are coming and analysts say that’s due to government’s ‘drums of war’ rhetoric


More than four in 10 Australians are worried China may attack Australia, according to new polling, expressing a level of fear that is nearly as high as among Taiwan’s population.

The Australia Institute, a progressive thinktank that commissioned polling in both Australia and Taiwan, said the “astounding” findings may be partly explained by some government figures in Canberra “beating the drums of war”.

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US official warns China against ‘catastrophic’ move on Taiwan

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Kurt Campbell says Beijing assessing world’s response to Hong Kong crackdown to understand potential reaction on Taiwan

A senior US official has warned China not to seek emboldenment from its Hong Kong crackdown to move against Taiwan, as Japan’s deputy leader said it would defend Taiwan against an attack.

Kurt Campbell, coordinator for Indo-Pacific affairs on the US national security council, told a forum on Tuesday the US had tried to send a “clear message of deterrence across the Taiwan Strait” and any attempt by China to move on Taiwan would be “catastrophic”.

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China blasts Japanese minister’s ‘sinister’ remarks about Taiwan

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Beijing lodges diplomatic protest with Japan after defence minister calls island a ‘democratic country’

China and Japan are once again embroiled in a diplomatic row over Taiwan, in the latest example of Beijing’s extreme sensitivity over the status of the self-ruled island and Tokyo’s changing attitude towards Beijing.

Speaking to the US conservative thinktank Hudson Institute on Monday, Japan’s state minister of defence, Yasuhide Nakayama, spoke of a growing threat posed by Chinese and Russian collaboration, and said it was necessary to “wake up” to Beijing’s pressure on Taiwan and protect the island “as a democratic country”.

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Taiwan recalls trade officials from Hong Kong over ‘one-China’ clash

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Hong Kong demanded Taiwanese staff sign commitment to Beijing’s one-China principle in visa renewals

Taiwan says it has pulled back all but one staff member from its Hong Kong trade office after they refused to sign a commitment to the one-China principle required for visa renewals.

The officials returned from Hong Kong on Sunday, leaving just one colleague at the office, which acts as Taiwan’s diplomatic presence.

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‘Forces for good will prevail’: Joy in Taiwan as US sends 2.5m Covid vaccine doses

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The US donation has more than doubled Taiwan’s available vaccine stocks as it battles a rise in coronavirus infections

Taiwan has reacted with an outpouring of thanks to the United States for shipping 2.5m Covid-19 vaccine doses to the island, more than doubling its arsenal as it deals with a rise in domestic infections.

Washington, competing with Beijing to deepen geopolitical clout through “vaccine diplomacy”, initially had promised to donate 750,000 doses but increased that number as President Joe Biden’s administration advances its pledge to send 80m US-made shots around the world.

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Healing words: Taiwan’s tribes fight to save their disappearing languages

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The island’s Indigenous people are in a race against time to save their native tongues before they are lost forever

In a modest conference room near the edge of Taiwan’s Sun Moon Lake, Panu Kapamumu holds up an unwieldy A3 booklet. The home-printed document contains every known word of Thao, the language of his Indigenous tribe. Kapamumu runs his finger down the list, reading out a selection of Thao words, meanings and translations. He reads slowly and purposefully, a man in his sixties but still just a student of his mother tongue.

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A victim of its own success: how Taiwan failed to plan for a major Covid outbreak

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Once a poster child for blocking coronavirus, Taiwan failed to fully prepare a pandemic response or vaccination rollout

While most of the world suffered through hundreds of millions of cases and millions of deaths from Covid-19, the 23.5 million people in Taiwan largely lived a normal life, thanks to a well-documented strong and early response that saw it go 250 days without a single local case. It lobbied for inclusion in the World Health Organization’s decision-making body off the back of its undeniable success and expertise under the slogan “Taiwan can help”.

But now the tables have turned and the island itself is in need of assistance, after an outbreak that started among airline staff in April spread across the island. The government appears to have been caught short by something it thought would never happen: the poster child for outbreak prevention had apparently failed to fully prepare an outbreak response.

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Coronavirus live news: tests of new antibody drug on mice show promise; Czech Republic to reopen border with EU

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India announces free jabs for over-18s; Norway to shorten vaccine interval

Brazil’s health ministry has reported 37,156 new cases of coronavirus in the past 24 hours, and 1,010 deaths, according to Reuters:

The South American country has now registered 16,984,218 cases since the pandemic began, while the death toll has risen to 474,414, according to ministry data, in the world’s third worst outbreak outside the United States and India and its second-deadliest.

Portugal’s foreign minister has said that Spain’s decision to require a negative coronavirus test for people crossing the border must be “a mistake”, Reuters reported Lusa news agency saying on Monday:

Portugal had asked Spanish authorities for clarification on “what could only have been a mistake”, Portugal’s foreign minister Augusto Santos Silva said.

“We have asked Spanish authorities for clarification and await it being granted as quickly as possible, because if not we will need to adopt equivalent reciprocal measures,” Santos Silva said, adding that “the epidemiological situation in Spain is, at the moment, worse than what we are living in Portugal.”

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‘Urgent need’: US to donate 750,000 Covid vaccine doses to Taiwan

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Offer a welcome boost for Taiwan, which says China has interfered with its attempts to secure vaccines internationally

The United States will donate 750,000 Covid-19 vaccine doses to Taiwan as part of the country’s plan to share shots globally, offering a much-needed boost to the island’s fight against the pandemic.

Taiwan is dealing with a spike in domestic cases but has been affected, like many places, by global vaccines shortages. It has also claimed that China is hindering its attempts to secure doses internationally.

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Uefa and UK discuss easing restrictions for Euro 2020; Putin blames money for EU delay of Sputnik V approval

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UK currently has the strictest entry requirements of any host country; Russian president spoke as Serbia starts to produce vaccine

Here are some of the key developments over the past few hours:

A quarter of elderly black people in the UK have not been vaccinated, recent figures show, despite signs that hesitancy is improving generally.

Nearly six months after the government kicked off the country’s most ambitious vaccination campaign, almost one in four black people over the age of 70 were not vaccinated as of 26 May, compared with 97% of white people of the same age.

Related: One in four elderly black people in the UK still not vaccinated

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John Cena apologises for calling Taiwan a country amid Chinese backlash – video

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The Fast & Furious star and wrestler John Cena has apologised for calling Taiwan ‘a country’ in an interview he gave to a Taiwanese broadcaster this month. ‘I made a mistake. I love and respect Chinese people,’ Cena said to his 600,000 fans on his Chinese Weibo account. The controversy began when he told the Taiwanese broadcaster TVBS in Mandarin ‘Taiwan is the first country that can watch’ his latest film, Fast & Furious 9. 

China sees Taiwan as a part of its own territory, and rejects any reference to the self-governed island as an independent state

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John Cena ‘very sorry’ for saying Taiwan is a country

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Fast & Furious actor and wrestler apologises profusely on social media for offending Chinese fans

Fast & Furious star and wrestler John Cena began learning Mandarin Chinese nearly a decade ago. But this month, by showing off his linguistic skill in Taiwan, he got into trouble in mainland China.

On Tuesday, Cena apologised for calling Taiwan “a country” in an interview he gave to a Taiwanese broadcaster early this month, saying that it was not appropriate.

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‘Not a lot of trust’: Taiwan wrestles with home working in wake of Covid surge

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Work culture of presenteeism sees some staff told to switch on GPS location tracking by distrustful managers

When Amanda asked a colleague to bring her laptop home from their tech-company office, anticipating that Taipei was about to join the ranks of global cities suddenly working remotely, managers refused to release it. She told him to grab it anyway, and soon enough the Taiwanese capital was placed under restrictions amid a shock coronavirus outbreak. Her company soon sent an office-wide email saying that 50% of staff would be staying home.

“But it still had reminders that working from home means you are working at home and your equipment must be connected at all times, and you’re expected to work eight hours and this is not a holiday,” she says.

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Chips with everything: how one Taiwanese company drives the world economy

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A Covid-driven global shortage of microchips has put manufacturer TSMC at the heart of the world’s recovery, as well as US-China tensions

Living on an island long coveted by a large and increasingly powerful neighbour, the residents of Taiwan have given some thought to where might be the best place to go should the worst happen. Some think it might be the hills, others historic buildings that China will want to preserve. By the same reasoning, some believe it is the factory run by the world’s biggest computer chip maker, TSMC.

Taiwan has for decades been both a global strategic flashpoint and one of the world’s economic powerhouses. In an industrial park about an hour’s drive from Taipei, those twin identities merge almost perfectly in the form of the factory run by TSMC, the world’s largest maker of computer chips – a facility so vital that some Taiwanese think it could be the safest place to flee to should China one day invade.

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Lockdowns and panic-buying in Taiwan as Covid cases rise

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Country widely considered to have had one of best pandemic responses now racing to contain outbreak

Taiwan reported 206 new local cases of Covid-19 on Sunday, breaking the previous day’s record high of 180 as authorities brought in the strictest measures yet in a bid to contain the virus.

The outbreak, which began about three weeks ago among employees of the national airline and a connected quarantine hotel, has now produced about 85% of Taiwan’s total number of locally transmitted cases since the pandemic began.

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Taiwan records 180 new cases in island’s worst Covid outbreak of pandemic

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New restrictions, including a mandate on mask-wearing and limits on gatherings in the capital, Taipei, will stay in place for two weeks

Taiwan has reported 180 new cases of Covid-19 as it rushes to contain the worst outbreak the island has seen since the pandemic began. Authorities have raised the alert level in Taipei and the neighbouring county of New Taipei, limiting family gatherings, and ordering numerous industries to close.

Taiwan has been one of the world’s pandemic success stories, and its case numbers remain low relative to outbreaks around the world. But Saturday’s cases, which bring its total number so far to about 1,470 among a population of 24 million, mark the highest rates of community transmission since the pandemic began. Until now almost all of Taiwan’s cases were detected in new arrivals held in hotel quarantine.

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Parts of Taiwan lock down after record 29 new Covid cases

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Bars, restaurants and entertainment venues in Taipei to close and rapid testing stations to be set up

Taipei’s mayor has announced the indefinite closure of bars, internet cafes, gaming and entertainment venues and public sport centres from Saturday after Taiwan reported 29 new community transmission cases of Covid-19, its highest single-day figure since the pandemic began, including seven with no known source.

Business closures were announced by local governments in the capital and in other northern counties in response to the growing outbreak in those areas, going beyond national restrictions set by the central government. There was initial confusion about the types of businesses affected, and an earlier declaration of closing at midnight was later extended to 8am Saturday to give time to prepare. People in Taipei appeared to be heeding the warning and staying home on Friday evening.

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Beijing accuses G7 ministers of interfering in China’s affairs

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Foreign ministry responds to west’s human rights claims, saying countries should ‘face up to their own problems’

China has rejected accusations of human rights abuse and economic coercion, made by G7 foreign ministers, accusing them of “blatantly meddling” in China’s internal affairs, calling their remarks groundless.

“Attempts to disregard the basic norms of international relations and to create various excuses to interfere in China’s internal affairs, undermine China’s sovereignty and smear China’s image will never succeed,” said the foreign ministry spokesperson, Wang Wenbin. “They should not criticise and interfere with other countries with a superior mentality, and undermine the current top priority of international anti-epidemic cooperation.”

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Hotlines ‘ring out’: China’s military crisis strategy needs rethink, says Biden Asia chief

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Kurt Campbell says Beijing has been increasing military activities without taking measures to reduce the chance of miscalculation

The Biden administration’s top Asia official has warned about the absence of a crisis-communications channel between the US and China at a time of rising military tensions over Taiwan and the South China Sea.

Military and leadership hotlines have been established at various points in the fraught history of the relationship, but Kurt Campbell, the White House Asia “tsar” responsible for coordinating policy across the administration, said Beijing had shown no interest in using them, out of a preference for uncertainty. The hotline simply rings out in “empty rooms”, he said.

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