Taiwan Today

Territorial waters surrounding Taiwan’s outlying islands of Kinmen and Matsu are an integral part of ROC territory and must be included within the country’s boundaries, according to President Ma Ying-jeou Nov. 23. “The government will include the two islands inside the nation’s boundary line following the second set of territorial water delineations,” Ma said during a meeting on the issue. The meeting was held to clarify a recently revised regulation on the country’s official territorial waters promulgated by the Cabinet Nov. 18, which omitted Kinmen and Mastu. Officials in attendance included Vice President Vincent Siew, Premier Wu Den-yih, President of the Legislative Yuan Wang Jin-pyng and Presidential Office Secretary-General and Kuomintang Vice Chairman Chan Chun-po. Regarding speculation that Kinmen and Matsu were omitted as part of a secret deal between Taipei and Beijing, Presidential Office spokesman Wang Yu-chi denied such charges. “It is a mystery why territorial waters off Kinmen and Mastu were excluded from ROC jurisdiction when the government first promulgated the charts in 1999,” Wang said. “This went unchanged even when the Democratic Progressive Party was in power.” Premier Wu, however, believes he has the answer and said that Kinmen and Matsu were deliberately excluded for nearly 10 years in keeping with the cross-strait consensus of setting aside disputes and creating a win-win situation for both sides. According to the Ministry of the Interior, the government plans to chart the boundaries of the territorial waters surrounding the outlying islands of Kinmen and Matsu within one year. The latest promulgated delineations show the ROC’s territorial waters and contiguous areas extending from Taiwan proper and its immediate offshore islands to Penghu and the Diaoyutai Islands, as well as Dongsha and Taiping islands in the South China Sea, but fail to touch on Kinmen and Matsu, both of which lie closer to mainland China than to Taiwan proper. (CYH-JSM)