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he head of the Norwegian armed forces is warning fellow NATO countries that they only have “two, maybe three” years to brace for a Russian attack — just days after it was revealed that Germany is preparing for the likelihood as well. Norwegian Gen. Eirik Kristoffersen claimed Moscow is building up its military stockpile at a rate far faster than previously predicted, all while Western nations have depleted their own weapons by supplying them to Ukraine, according to local outlet Daglabet. “There is a window now that will perhaps last for one, two, maybe three years, where we have to...

TAIPEI, Jan 22 (Reuters) - Taiwan's export orders fell more than expected in their worst performance in six months in December, with the outlook for the island's high-tech products remaining poor due to growing doubts about global economic growth. Export orders last month slipped 16.0% from a year ago to $43.81 billion, the worst showing since July and well below the average analyst forecasts of a 0.25% decline predicted in a Reuters poll. Orders edged up 1.0% year-on-year in November. ... Weak demand for Taiwan's technology products amid global economic uncertainty has prompted the government to forecast that for 2023...

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said that Ireland’s policy on China and Taiwan has not changed, despite reports in Chinese state media following his meeting in Dublin with Chinese premier Li Qiang. Earlier, CGTN quoted Mr. Varadkar as saying that Ireland “will always abide by the one-China principle, and hopes that China will achieve peaceful reunification at an early date”. However, Mr. Varadkar said Ireland supported the One China “policy” on Taiwan, which is distinct from the One China “principle”. He said: “I reaffirmed our policy, which is the One China policy, that we recognize that Taiwan is part of China....

On Saturday morning, Biden shuffled into a media scrum on the South Lawn to offer a few remarks before heading to Camp David for a weekend vacation after his Carribean vacation. 8,000 miles away voters in the Republic of China, also known as Taiwan, had just elected President ‘William’ Lai who had promised to preserve the nation’s independence from its greedy Communist superpower neighbor. “Mr. President, do you have a reaction to the Taiwan election?” a reporter asked. “We do not support independence,” Biden mumbled. He did not congratulate Taiwan’s new president-elect because that would offend China. In December, Chinese...

The Democratic Progressive Party won decisively, affirming that most Taiwanese want to maintain Taiwan’s separation from communist China.The Taiwanese elected William Lai Ching-te of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) as their next president, despite Beijing’s threat that voting for Lai would lead to war.The campaign to succeed Taiwan’s incumbent President Tsai Ing-wen, who will step down in May due to term limits, was a fierce three-way race, including Vice President Lai of the DPP, Hou Yu-ih of the Kuomintang (KMT), and Ko Wen-je from the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). Beijing accuses the DPP of “promoting” Taiwan’s independence, a red line...

President Joe Biden offered no words of congratulations or support to Taiwanese President-elect Lai Ching-te following his election victory on Saturday, telling reporters simply that America does “not support independence.” Lai, of the anti-communist Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), defeated two leftist rivals on Saturday to hand his party an unprecedented third term in power. Lai is currently the vice president of the country and will succeed current DPP President Tsai Ing-wen.

Taiwan just pushed back against bully China’s threats and elected a pro-Western, pro-sovereignty candidate to be president of the island nation. William Lai Ching-te, the current Vice President of Taiwan and candidate of the Democratic Progressive Party defeated his rivals from the Kuomintang (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). He won the election handily, as by 8 p.m. Taipei time, Lai had garnered 40% of the vote. His closest competitor, Hou Yu-ih, candidate of the KMT and mayor of New Taipei, lagged behind with 33%. Moreover, Lai’s predecessor, current President Tsai Ing-Wen enjoyed eight years as leader of Taiwan,...

Welcome to another attempt at Media Excellence January should be designated as "FBI Crimes Month" everything from January 6th to the FBI's extensive spying on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. comes to mind... Was it only yesterday that the High and Mighty ESPN fired Rush Limbaugh as a Sunday commentator on its NFL Pre-Game Show?... Giuffre and Dershowitz fought it out in court cut a deal but Giuffre saying she did not "exonerate" Mr. Dershowitz in her deal with him. But in the last set of documents that came out Tuesday the deposition of Sarah Ransome and her allegations regarding...

TAIPEI—Taiwan will hold a presidential election this weekend that will have global and regional ramifications. The frontrunner, current Vice President Lai Ching-te, has vowed to protect Taiwan’s autonomy from Chinese aggression and strengthen ties with the United States. Beijing has intimidated Taiwan by buzzing its airspace with fighter jets and sending spy balloons and satellites over the island. But there’s another enemy vying to take Lai down, and it’s on TikTok. The popular social platform, owned by Chinese company ByteDance, has been flooded with false or sensationalized videos by accounts exhibiting behavior consistent with organized Chinese disinformation operations, experts say....

World leaders congratulated Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) for a historic third presidential term even as President Biden warned that the U.S. will not endorse independence for the island. "We do not support independence," Biden told reporters when asked for comment on DPP candidate William Lai’s victory over the rival Koumintang (KMT) party following Saturday’s election. Lai, who also goes by his Chinese name, Ching-te, declared victory after a tightly contested election saw him beat KMT candidate Hou Yu-ih, the mayor of New Taipei City. Beijing had not declared a clear preference for any candidate, but Chinese officials framed...

Taiwan’s ruling party, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), secured a historic third term on Saturday as Vice President Lai Ching-te won the country’s widely watched presidential election with more than 40 percent of the vote. Lai, along with his running mate Hsiao Bi-khim – Taiwan’s former representative to the United States – won a total of more than 5 million votes. Taiwan’s electoral system is based on first-past-the-post voting, awarding the victory to the presidential-VP pairing with the highest percentage of votes. Turnout was put at more than 60 percent with some 19.5 million Taiwanese eligible to vote. A favourite...

Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate William Lai, also known by his Chinese name of Ching-te, has emerged victorious after a tightly contested presidential election as the island’s next leader, Fox News Digital confirms. "The results are in, and Taiwan’s voters stood up to China and all its war talk of recent weeks," Gordon Chang, Gatestone Institute Senior Fellow and China expert, told Fox News Digital. "Free people, living just a hundred miles from the menacing Chinese state, refused to be intimidated." Lai, defeated his rival, New Taipei City Mayor Hou Yu-ih of the Kuomintang (KMT) party, by just...

The Nationalist Party of China (KMT) – the party which Beijing prefers – has conceded defeat in the Taiwanese elections. With well over half of the votes counted, Taiwan’s ruling party is set to declare victory in their presidential elections. It is a setback for China, which views the Democratic Progressive Party as dangerous separatists. The DPP’s candidate, Taiwanese Vice-President Lai Ching-te, is in the lead with 40.5 per cent of the vote, and is due to speak to the gathered press at 8:30pm (local time). He is followed by KMT candidate Hou Yu-ih with 33.3 per cent, and TPP...

2024 Presidential and Vice Presidential Election 2024 Legislative Election

Its Saturday in Taiwan voting in the Presidential Election underway... Major bank Citigroup planning to cut 20,000 jobs over the next two years... US federal prosecutors seeking the death penalty in a 'hate crime" mass murder... A lot of drama and attention focused on the southern US border and the situation at Eagle Pass, Texas... US Secretary of State Antony Blinken meeting a top Chinese Communist Party official in Washington... Journalist Gonzalo Lira a citizen of Chile and the US dying in a Ukrainian prison... More strikes underway in Yemen tonight... US politics and Joe Biden talking about a "judgement...

American foreign policy experts have long argued that China has been laying the groundwork for a permanent rise as a major global power, and U.S. politicians (particularly on the Republican side) have certainly counted the ways in which China is clearly our No. 1 geopolitical foe. However, China's ascendency isn't without its setbacks, and at times it seems possible that China is closer to declining than rising. Their economy hasn't recovered since COVID-19, and Chinese President Xi Jinping has been dealing with more internal struggles than were previously let on. One such problem for the leader of the Chinese Communist...

HONG KONG—For months now, I’ve been told that Hong Kong’s protests would end soon. They’ll end when school starts, I heard during the summer. School did start, but the protests wore on, only now I saw high-school students in crisp school uniforms joining the protesters’ ranks. Next, the mask ban of early October was supposed to slow protesters down, but the very first day after that ban, I watched streams of protesters in masks and helmets make their way to their usual haunts on Hong Kong Island. The government shut down many of the subway lines that day, a practice...

The PRC has adopted a sustained coercive campaign against the Philippines to seize its sovereign territory. The world is witnessing this aggression today in the South China Sea. Awarning from the 20th century is that dictatorships tend to use aggression not first against great powers but against smaller states. Hitler pressured Austria and seized the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia before seizing the rest of the Czech Republic, turning Slovakia into a protectorate, and seizing Memel (Klaipeda) from Lithuania. After checking Japan in 1938 and 1939 in the Far East, Stalin aggressed against Poland with his ally Nazi Germany before turning to...

Chinese president Xi Jinping has warned that 'all Chinese on both sides of the Taiwan Strait' will be 'reunified' in his sabre-rattling New Year message. He said today that China's reunification with Taiwan is inevitable as he addressed the nation less than two weeks before the Chinese-claimed island elects a new leader. 'All Chinese on both sides of the Taiwan Strait should be bound by a common sense of purpose and share in the glory of the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,' Xi said according to state news agency Xinhua.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has released an assessment of what this administration has helped accomplish in 2023, and this doozy requires a beverage warning. Ready? OK, here you go: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Secretary Antony Blinken @SecBlinken As I reflect on the miles traveled, countries visited, and intense diplomacy over the past year, I am proud of our work to build stronger partnerships and strengthen global peace and security. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken calls America’s partnerships its greatest strategic asset. In 2023, he traveled more than 380,000 kilometers and visited over two dozen countries to meet with our nation’s...