🇹🇼 Foxconn founder Terry Gou says he will seek Taiwan presidency

Terry Gou, the billionaire founder of major Apple supplier Foxconn, said that he will seek the presidential nomination for Taiwan’s main opposition party, the Kuomintang (KMT), for a second time.

Speaking to reporters on his return from a week-long trip to the United States, Gou said the only way to avoid war with China was to lessen Sino-US tensions and get Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party out of office.

The KMT is still in the process of choosing its candidate for the next presidential election, due in January 2024, with Hou Yu-ih, mayor of New Taipei City, broadly considered the current frontrunner.

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🇺🇸🇹🇼 Taiwan to buy 400 US anti-ship missiles to face China threat

Taiwan will buy as many as 400 US land-launched Harpoon missiles in the face of rising threat from China, Bloomberg News reported on Monday.

The Pentagon announced a $1.17 billion contract for 400 of the anti-ship missiles on April 7 without naming the buyer, saying production was expected to be completed by March 2029. Bloomberg said Taiwan was the buyer.

When asked about the news report, Taiwan Defense Ministry spokesperson Sun Li-fang told a regular media conference the ministry had previously disclosed information about the purchase, adding it was "confident" the deal would continue according to schedule.

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🇹🇼 Taiwan's Kuomintang to pick New Taipei City mayor as presidential candidate

According to sources, Taiwan's main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) party will pick New Taipei City mayor Hou Yu-ih to be its presidential candidate in the election next year.

The senior party source said the KMT will announce Hou as the presidential candidate later on Wednesday. A second party source said Hou is widely expected within the party to become the candidate.

Hou said earlier this month he objected to Taiwan's formal independence as well as Beijing's offer to rule the island under the "one country, two systems" formula of governance, similar to the arrangement in Hong Kong.

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🇺🇸🇹🇼 US to send additional security assistance to Taiwan soon

The United States will soon send additional security assistance to Taiwan, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said.

"The United States will soon provide significant additional security assistance to Taiwan through (the) presidential drawdown authority that Congress authorized last year," Austin told lawmakers.

Earlier this month it was reported that US President Joe Biden's administration plans to send $500 million worth of weapons aid to Taiwan using the authority.

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🇹🇼🇺🇸 Taiwan kicks off annual Han Kuang war games with computerized simulations

Taiwan has kicked off five days of computerized war games aimed at potential attacks by Beijing’s People’s Liberation Army, with US military personnel expected to be acting as observers.

The tabletop drills began at the Hengshan Military Command Centre in Taipei on Monday, Taiwanese military officials said. As in previous years, the exercise will also feature a live-fire segment, which will be staged in July.

Military spokesman declined to say if the US had sent observers to take part in the online drills. But Taiwanese Defence Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng had confirmed earlier this month that US military personnel would join in both the computerized and live-fire segments of the Han Kuang exercise.

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🇹🇼 Taiwan excluded from WHO annual assembly

Taiwan failed in its efforts to gain an invitation to the World Health Organization's annual assembly.

The annual assembly in Geneva on Monday decided not to extend Taiwan an invitation to the event which runs from May 21-30. China and Pakistan urged members to reject Taiwan's inclusion.

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🇹🇼🇨🇳 Taiwan sends up fighters as Chinese warplanes cross strait's median line

Taiwan's air force scrambled into action on Sunday after spotting 10 Chinese warplanes crossing the median line of the Taiwan Strait.

Taiwan's defense ministry said that on Sunday it had detected 24 Chinese air force planes, including J-10, J-11, J-16 and Su-30 fighters, as well as H-6 bombers.

This is the second time in less than a week that Taiwan has reported renewed Chinese military activity, after 37 Chinese military aircraft on Thursday flew into the island's air defense zone.

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