Taipei

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- When Beijing announced the route the Olympic flame will travel from Greece to China ahead of the 2008 Summer Games, officials dubbed the 85,000-mile odyssey a "journey of harmony." But for Taiwan, an island that has ruled itself for almost 60 years but which Beijing claims as a renegade province, the trip may underscore a legacy of distrust and tension between the rival governments. Ever since Beijing announced the route in April, declaring that the torch would travel from Vietnam to Taipei, Taiwan's capital, and then to Chinese-controlled Hong Kong, Taipei and Beijing have traded rhetorical blows.

Orioles left-hander Wei-Yin Chen is leaning toward not pitching for his native Taiwan in this spring's World Baseball Classic in March, according to an industry source. Taiwan, which competes internationally as Chinese Taipei, is playing in a World Baseball Classic qualifier next week in Taiwan against the Philippines, New Zealand and Thailand. Chen, who pitched for Chinese Taipei in the 2008 Beijing Olympics - he was 1-0 in two starts - and was a member of the team in the 2004 Athens Olympics, was 12-11 during his rookie campaign with the Orioles and was the winning pitcher in Game 2 of the American League Division Series.

TAIPEI, Taiwan - Thousands of opponents staged a raucous sit-in yesterday to protest President Chen Shui-bian's narrow re-election victory, and a high court sealed ballot boxes to await a possible recount. Chen's political rival, Lien Chan, urged supporters at a rally in Taipei to forge ahead with protests until judges agree to recount 13,000 sealed ballot boxes. A decision on the matter could come today. As violent protests erupted in southern Taiwan, about 10,000 people jammed a boulevard in front of the presidential palace in the capital, Taipei.

She's wearing white knee socks and black high-heeled Mary Janes, a ruffled headband, and a short petticoat-lined dress with puff sleeves, rounded collar and a patch-pocket apron, and she's here to pour your tea and serve cucumber finger sandwiches. French maid not your thing? Go dinosaur. A waitress in a tattered-hem cheetah-print miniskirt, black tank top, leather tool belt and a plastic bone-and-bead necklace, the pink bows on her fishnet socks peeking over Uggs, will bring you a big bowl of "three-flavored sauce chicken" and a plate of grilled sausages.

She's wearing white knee socks and black high-heeled Mary Janes, a ruffled headband, and a short petticoat-lined dress with puff sleeves, rounded collar and a patch-pocket apron, and she's here to pour your tea and serve cucumber finger sandwiches. French maid not your thing? Go dinosaur. A waitress in a tattered-hem cheetah-print miniskirt, black tank top, leather tool belt and a plastic bone-and-bead necklace, the pink bows on her fishnet socks peeking over Uggs, will bring you a big bowl of "three-flavored sauce chicken" and a plate of grilled sausages.

BEIJING - While Washington may view its decision to sell less-sophisticated arms to Taiwan as something of a compromise, analysts on both sides of the Taiwan Strait predicted this morning that the sales will exacerbate already strained Sino-U.S. relations. Although the United States deferred a decision to sell the Aegis radar system, Beijing will probably view the new package as further evidence that Washington intends to aggressively check China's ambitions in the region. "I think these arms sales to Taiwan will definitely have a negative impact on Sino-U.

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- China swiftly rejected Taiwan's attempt to repair relations yesterday, returning -- unopened -- a letter that explained President Lee Teng-hui's controversial call for "special state-to-state" ties.Lee's declaration this month that Taiwan should be recognized as a "special state" and not a renegade Chinese province infuriated Beijing, which interpreted it as a move toward independence. Beijing hinted that it would suspend planned talks unless Taipei "clarified" the statement.

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- The party that has ruled Taiwan for the last 45 years lost an election yesterday for control of Taiwan's capital city to an opposition party advocating that the island declare formal independence from China.But the long-dominant Kuomintang, or Nationalist Party, retained the governorship of Taiwan, thereby offering support to Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui and his policy of gradual rapprochement with mainland China.The Kuomintang, whose leaders fled China in 1949 after being defeated by the Communists, also kept control of the country's second city, Kaohsiung.

There were two ways to interpret the recent Taiwan election. One was as a victory for stability, because the ruling Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate for governor of Taiwan beat the pro-independence candidate handily. The other was as a provocative slap at the local establishment and at Communist China, because the independence candidate won for mayor of Taipei, the capital city, with 44 percent in a three-way race.The Taipei stock market chose the first interpretation. It surged. Clearly, Taiwanese capitalists believe their boat is not rocked.

TAIPEI, Taiwan - A delegation of Taiwanese military officers visited Washington this month and met with officials from several U.S. government agencies in the most extensive contact of its kind in more than two decades. The 20-member delegation, headed by air force Gen. Lin Yu-bao and comprising mainly majors and colonels, met with officials from the State Department, the National Security Council, intelligence agencies and the Pentagon during its 10-day stay in the nation's capital, participants said.

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Yesterday, Taiwan elected its first president who had campaigned for closer economic relations with Beijing, paving the way for a considerable lessening of tensions in one of Asia's oldest flash points. Ma Ying-jeou, a Harvard-educated lawyer and former Taipei mayor from the Nationalist Party, won by a convincing margin. He prevailed despite a last-minute effort by his opponent, Frank Hsieh of the Democratic Progressive Party, to caution voters that the Chinese crackdown in Tibet was a warning of what could also happen to Taiwan if it did not stand up to Beijing.

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- When Beijing announced the route the Olympic flame will travel from Greece to China ahead of the 2008 Summer Games, officials dubbed the 85,000-mile odyssey a "journey of harmony." But for Taiwan, an island that has ruled itself for almost 60 years but which Beijing claims as a renegade province, the trip may underscore a legacy of distrust and tension between the rival governments. Ever since Beijing announced the route in April, declaring that the torch would travel from Vietnam to Taipei, Taiwan's capital, and then to Chinese-controlled Hong Kong, Taipei and Beijing have traded rhetorical blows.

TAIPEI, Taiwan --Facing an attempt in the Legislature to pass a referendum on recalling the president, the Taiwanese government unexpectedly announced yesterday that it had reached a deal with Beijing to allow many charter flights to and from mainland China. The agreement is the most recent of several signs that relations between Taipei and Beijing might be thawing, a change that has occurred as a political crisis surrounding the president, Chen Shui-bian, has deepened. Chen is known for opposing closer ties to the mainland, which considers Taiwan a breakaway province.

TAIPEI, Taiwan - Riot police fought with demonstrators and used water cannons mounted on armored cars last night as a large rally in front of the presidential palace turned unexpectedly violent. A crowd estimated by organizers at 300,000 and by the police at 100,000 assembled peacefully yesterday afternoon to call for a parliamentary investigation into a shooting incident that wounded President Chen Shui-bian on the eve of elections last month and may have helped him win re-election. Most of the crowd dispersed at sunset, but a few thousand remained and began skirmishing with riot police.

TAIPEI, Taiwan - Hours after nearly 500,000 opposition supporters protested outside his offices in central Taipei, President Chen Shui-bian agreed late yesterday to meet with his two main political rivals for talks in what is being viewed as a major step toward resolving Taiwan's post-election crisis. "Without any precondition, I hope to conduct a summit with Chairman Lien and Chairman Soong next Monday," Chen said at a news conference, referring to opposition presidential candidate Lien Chan and his vice presidential running mate, People's First Party leader James Soong.

TAIPEI, Taiwan - Thousands of opponents staged a raucous sit-in yesterday to protest President Chen Shui-bian's narrow re-election victory, and a high court sealed ballot boxes to await a possible recount. Chen's political rival, Lien Chan, urged supporters at a rally in Taipei to forge ahead with protests until judges agree to recount 13,000 sealed ballot boxes. A decision on the matter could come today. As violent protests erupted in southern Taiwan, about 10,000 people jammed a boulevard in front of the presidential palace in the capital, Taipei.

TAIPEI, Taiwan - The World Health Organization extended its warning yesterday against unnecessary travel to Taiwan's beleaguered capital city, along with the mainland Chinese areas of Tianjin and Inner Mongolia as the SARS epidemic continued to inflict economic and social damage across Asia. The new WHO warning expanded the alert beyond the current advisories against travel to the Chinese areas of Beijing, Hong Kong, Guangdong province and Shanxi province, which have been the focus of the outbreak of the pneumonia-like severe acute respiratory syndrome.

THE THREAT of crisis between China and Taiwan receded when the party that has ruled the island since the 1940s made a surprising comeback in elections last week.After Taiwan went democratic in 1987 and the Kuomintang, or Nationalist Party, gave up its monopoly on power, the tide turned away from mainland refugees of 1949 toward native-born Taiwanese.When native Chen Shui-bian of the Democratic Progressive Party, became mayor of Taipei in 1994, he also became favored to win the presidency in 2000 on a platform declaring independence.

HONG KONG - Taiwanese officials said today that they plan to proceed with a referendum next March despite White House criticism, and called for the United States to respect and support the island's democracy. President Chen Shui-bian announced Friday that he would hold a referendum March 20 calling for China to withdraw all missiles aimed at Taiwan and to renounce the use of force against the island. A senior Bush administration official in Washington said yesterday that the United States did not want the referendum held and suggested that it might reduce Taiwan's security by antagonizing China, instead of enhancing it. But Joseph Wu, Chen's deputy chief of staff for foreign policy, said Taiwan was determined to proceed with the vote.

TAIPEI, Taiwan - The World Health Organization extended its warning yesterday against unnecessary travel to Taiwan's beleaguered capital city, along with the mainland Chinese areas of Tianjin and Inner Mongolia as the SARS epidemic continued to inflict economic and social damage across Asia. The new WHO warning expanded the alert beyond the current advisories against travel to the Chinese areas of Beijing, Hong Kong, Guangdong province and Shanxi province, which have been the focus of the outbreak of the pneumonia-like severe acute respiratory syndrome.