Eye On Taiwan

Coronavirus Makes America Seem Like a Civilization in Decline Posted: 29 Mar 2020 12:53 PM PDT Bloomberg Date: March 29, 2020 By: Noah Smith, Bloomberg News (Bloomberg Opinion) — Crises such wars, depressions, natural disasters and pandemics can reveal differences in how effectively a society organizes itself. In the 1600s and 1700s, for example, Britain’s more advanced tax system allowed it to outspend Spain and France, while Prussia’s efficient army let it overcome larger opponents such as Austria. In the Civil War, the Union's industrial prowess allowed it to outlast and overwhelm the agrarian Confederacy. Pandemics aren’t quite the same as wars, but they can also illustrate startling differences in the effectiveness of different countries. China, the place where coronavirus first appeared, initially tried to hush up evidence of the outbreak before pivoting to a draconian crackdown that was crudely effective. South Korea and Taiwan, scarred by the SARS epidemic 17 years ago, were ready with effective response systems that tested large numbers of people and traced their contacts in order to isolate contagious individuals before they showed symptoms. European countries tended to respond less effectively, with Italy and Spain having two of the worst outbreaks and the U.K. dithering over its strategy while wasting crucial time. But perhaps no advanced nation has responded as poorly as the U.S. Perverse regulation, a bungled government test and fragmented supply chains held back testing for crucial weeks, allowing the epidemic to spread undetected. Abdication of leadership by the federal government left the job of shutdowns to state and local governments. Meanwhile, the president has issued highly unrealistic predictions that lockdowns could end in as little as two weeks. As a result, the U.S. now leads the world  in cases of the coronavirus. It’s possible that the U.S.’s scattershot, slow and ineffective response to this crisis is a result of leadership failures or the recent era of political division. President Donald Trump eliminated a pandemic response team at the National Security Council, his appointments to the Centers for Disease Control and the Food and Drug Administration have been controversial, and his messaging has generally been unhelpful and conflicting.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan’s former deputy defense minister killed in single-car crash Posted: 29 Mar 2020 12:48 PM PDT Retired Taiwan general crashes into traffic island on highway, dies in hospital Taiwan News Date: 2020/03/29 By: Ching-Tse Cheng, Taiwan News, Staff Writer Former Deputy Defense Minister Wang Wen-hsieh. (Facebook photo) TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Former Deputy Minister of National Defense Wang Wen-hsieh (王文燮) was killed in a single-car accident on the New Taipei Huanhe Expressaway on Sunday (March 29). According to the Liberty Times, the 87-year-old Wang struck a traffic island on the highway Sunday morning and fell unconscious as a result of the collision. Despite being rushed to Cardinal Tien Hospital in the New Taipei district of Yonghe, the veteran eventually died after medical staff failed to stabilize his condition. Wang's family told media that Wang was very healthy for his age and enjoyed driving around northern Taiwan by himself. Based on surveillance footage, police confirmed that Wang died in a single-car crash, and no other vehicles were involved. Wang was sober when the accident took place, according to the authorities. The real cause of the fatal tragedy has not yet been determined.    [FULL  STORY]

KMT hopes voting age can be lowered to 18 before 2022 elections Posted: 29 Mar 2020 12:44 PM PDT Focus Taiwan Date: 03/29/2020 By: Liu Kuan-ting and Joseph Yeh Taipei, March 29 (CNA) Taiwan's main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) expressed hope Sunday that a recent proposal raised by the party to lower the legal voting age to 18 by means of constitutional amendments can be realized soon and put into practice before the 2022 local government elections. The proposal by the KMT to amend the Constitution to lower the legal voting age to 18 from the existing 20 and lower the age of candidacy to 20 from 23 was sent to committee review Friday. The party's newly elected chairman, Chiang Chi-chen (江啟臣), then called on the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to establish a constitutional reform committee to discuss the issue. Speaking during a press event Sunday, KMT legislative deputy caucus whip Lin Yi-hua (林奕華) said the party hopes that the proposal will be supported by the public and that the amendments to the Constitution can be passed soon.    [FULL  STORY]

Virus Outbreak: Fifteen new cases push total near 300 Posted: 29 Mar 2020 12:39 PM PDT CLUSTERED CASES: People who boarded EVA Airways Flight BR282 on March 20 should immediately seek medical help if they develop symptoms, the CECC said Taipei Times Date: Mar 30, 2020 By: Lee I-chia / Staff reporter Volunteers from Tainan Community University’s Taijiang campus yesterday hold signs in front of a temple to raise community awareness about preventing the spread of COVID-19. Photo: Tsai Wen-chu, Taipei Times The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday announced 15 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total number of confirmed cases in Taiwan to 298. Fourteen of the new cases — nine men and five women — are imported cases who had returned to Taiwan between March 14 and Friday, said Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center. Among them are three clusters of cases, including a married couple who visited Indonesia form March 10 to March 14, developed symptoms on Sunday last week and sought medical help on Thursday, he said.The second clustered case is a man who visited Morocco from March 10 to Sunday last week in a tour group, in which another traveler tested positive last week, Chen said. [FULL  STORY]

Hassled in China, American Journalists Are Invited to Try Taiwan. Why Would They Go? Posted: 29 Mar 2020 12:20 PM PDT VOA Date:\ March 29, 2020 By: Ralph Jennings/ Wall Street Journal China Bureau Chief Jonathan Cheng, left, poses for a photo with Journal reporters, from left, Julie Wernau, Stephanie Yang, and Stu Woo before their departure at Beijing Capital International Airport in Beijing, Saturday, March 28, 2020. The publishers of three major American newspapers wrote an open letter on Tuesday asking China to reverse its recent decision to expel many of their correspondents working in the country. China last week expelled more than a dozen American journalists working for the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The Washington Post in what is believed to be the largest expulsion of foreign journalists from China since at least the 1960s. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein) Wall Street Journal China Bureau Chief Jonathan Cheng, left, poses for a photo with Journal reporters, from left, Julie Wernau, Stephanie Yang, and Stu Woo before their departure at Beijing Capital International Airport in Beijing, March 28, 2020. TAIPEI – Taiwan’s invitation to American journalists harassed by China to locate here instead would free them from government pressure but distance them from Asia’s hub for international news. Foreign minister Joseph Wu tweeted the invitation Saturday. He mentioned three media organizations whose reporters had been thrown out of China, apparently in response to U.S. curbs against journalists working for state-run Chinese media in the United States. “He said as that as New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post journalists face intensifying hostility in China, I would like to welcome you to be stationed in Taiwan, a country that’s a beacon of freedom and democracy,” ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou said, referring to Wu’s tweet.    [FULL  STORY]

Coronavirus: Can Taiwan repeat its success in controlling Covid-19, with new infections from US and Europe on the way? Posted: 29 Mar 2020 11:58 AM PDT Fast response, transparency and efficacy have been credited for island’s success in controlling the disease locally so far, experts say Taiwan will be tested in the weeks to come as Taiwanese return home from Europe and North America, where case numbers are rising South China Morning Post Date: 29 Mar, 2020 By: Lawrence Chung Taiwan’s initial success at controlling the spread of deadly coronavirus infections on the island has won it global recognition. But with scores of new infections and deaths being reported daily in the popular Taiwanese tourist destinations of Europe and the US, it remains to be seen whether the island’s efforts to check the disease will remain as effective as when the virus first spread from the mainland Chinese city of Wuhan, experts say. With half a million Taiwanese working on the mainland and a million people from the mainland visiting the self-governed island per year, some health experts had predicted that Taiwan would be the hardest hit locality when Covid-19 was first reported in Wuhan, the capital of central China’s Hubei province, which is less than two hours away from Taipei by air. As of the weekend, Taiwan had reported close to 300 confirmed cases and two deaths, compared with the mainland’s 3,300 deaths and more than 81,000 cases, according to Taiwan’s Central Epidemic Command Centre (CECC). By comparison, Italy has had more than 10,000 deaths and 92,000 cases, the US 2,500 deaths and 122,000 cases and Spain almost 6,000 deaths and 73,000 cases.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan’s Digital Minister says blockchain is a top priority Posted: 29 Mar 2020 11:02 AM PDT How Audrey Tang is using “very promising” distributed ledger technology to help government listen to its citizens at scale. Decrypt Date: Mar 29, 2020 By: Robert Stevens Taiwan is still figuring out how to “do” democracy, the country’s Digital Minister, Audrey Tang, told Decrypt. Taiwan’s democratic era only started after the country came out of martial law in the 90s—its first election was in 1996—making its constitution one of the first written in the Internet era. “In many other parts of the world, democracy is part of their culture, part of their tradition. To change it, you have to learn about hundreds of years of proud republican tradition,” she told Decrypt. But in Taiwan, “The people who designed the democracy systems are all still around and very active,” she added. Tang, the 38-year-old radical who’s leading Taiwan’s drive for technological innovation in governance, said that researching how blockchain can improve governance is a “top priority”. “Ledgers”—Tang prefers the term to blockchain—“are very promising. [They are] a cheap way to build accountability and some sort of legitimacy across sectors,” she said, which makes them particularly useful for governance.    [FULL  STORY]

KMT seeking to lower voting age before Taiwan’s 2022 elections Posted: 29 Mar 2020 10:56 AM PDT Party proposes constitutional amendments to lower voting age to 18, age of candidacy to 20 Taiwan News Date: 2020/03/29 By:  Central News Agency New KMT Chairman Chiang Chi-chen (CNA photo) Taiwan's main opposition party, the Kuomintang (KMT), expressed hope Sunday that a recent proposal raised by the party to lower the legal voting age to 18 by means of constitutional amendment can be realized soon and put into practice before the 2022 local government elections. The proposal by the KMT to amend the Constitution to lower the legal voting age to 18 from the current 20 and lower the age of candidacy to 20 from 23 was sent to committee review Friday (March 27). The party's newly elected chairman, Chiang Chi-chen (江啟臣), then called on the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to establish a constitutional reform committee to discuss the issue. Speaking during a press event Sunday, KMT legislative deputy caucus whip Lin Yi-hua (林奕華) said the party hopes that the proposal will be supported by the public and that the amendments to the Constitution can be passed soon.   [FULL  STORY]

Second group of Taiwanese tourists in Peru take private charter to U.S. Posted: 29 Mar 2020 10:51 AM PDT Focus Taiwan Date: 03/29/2020 By: Matt Yu and Chiang Yi-ching MOFA spokesperson Joanne Ou / CNA file photo Taipei, March 29 (CNA) 55 Taiwanese tourists flew from Peru to the United States on a private chartered jet Sunday, the second group of Taiwanese nationals to do so since the South American country closed its borders due to fears over the COVID-19 coronavirus disease. The passengers landed at Miami International Airport at 10 a.m. Sunday, according to Taiwan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), and will now be free to decide whether to return to Taiwan. The flight, chartered by LATAM Airlines, departed from Cusco, a southeastern city in Peru, with 38 Taiwanese on board, then flew to the capital, Lima, to pick up an additional 17 Taiwanese nationals, said MOFA spokesperson Joanne Ou (歐江安). Also on the flight were another 84 passengers of four different nationalities — Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, and the U.S. — bringing the total number of passengers to 139, Ou said. [FULL  STORY]

How technology can aid coronavirus lockdowns Posted: 29 Mar 2020 10:27 AM PDT India Today's study of the global techniques to enforce quarantines and lockdowns revealed that many of those nations have used the smartphone as a tool to monitor people's movements. India Today Date: March 29, 2020 By: Ankit Kumar  Singapore, China, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Israel and several other countries have already mounted tech-based surveillance measures. (File image: Reuters) As tens of thousands of migrant workers defied the world's largest lockdown in the country, an India Today analysis has found how a number of other nations have turned to technology to enforce restrictions in addition to physical measures to keep their populations safe from the Covid-19 pandemic. In the United Kingdom, one of the most advanced democracies sensitive about privacy issues, its Information Commissioner's Office has recently approved the use of phone data to monitor people's behaviour as part of efforts to contain the spread of coronavirus. Singapore, China, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Israel and several other countries have already mounted tech-based surveillance measures. India Today's study of the global techniques to enforce quarantines and lockdowns revealed that many of those nations have used the smartphone as a tool to monitor people's movements. [FULL  STORY]