Trouble Brewing in East Asia

"The more preparations we make, the less likely there will be rash attempts of aggression."

"The more united we are, the stronger and safer Taiwan would become."

Taiwan President Tsai Ing-won

"We [United States] will continue to assist Taiwan in maintaining a sufficient self defence capability in line with our long-standing commitments and consistent with our one China policy."

White House National Security Council

Aircraft of the Eastern Theater Command during a prior drill near Taiwan in August. Pic: Xinhua /AP

The entire region of East Asia shows indication of an uneasy peace slowly unravelling. North Korea sent drones  across its heavily fortified border with South Korea, with the South responding by scrambling fighter jets, flying surveillance and firing warning shots in deterrence. For the first time in five years a fresh escalation of tensions has erupted of an intensity that strikes concern, according to South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff. 

Attack helicopters were dispatched along with fighter jets to shoot down the drones. Several days earlier two short-range ballistic missiles were fired at the South. This is North Korea's method of protesting its displeasure at joint air drills carried out betwen South Korea and the United States; a rehearsal for an invasion, interpreted by North Korea. "Our military will thoroughly and resolutely respond to this kind of North Korea provation", director of operations Major General Lee Seung-o of the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff stated emphatically.

"[U.S. officials are] consulting closely with the [Republic of Korea] about the nature of this incursion. We recoggnize the need of the ROK to protect its territorial integrity", noted an unnamed White House National Security official. Taiwan, South Korea nervous of the intentions of China and North Korea. Joining them is Japan, edgily watching what is happening in its neighbourhood and fearing that it too is in North Korea's and China's crosshairs.

Tokyo is considering the possibility of a nuclear attack to match the growing fears of a potentially full-on conflict with either North Korea or China. Japan, the only nation on Earth that has ever suffered a nuclear attack, saw its cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki both devastated in the wake of the Second World War when nuclear devices were unleashed on an unsuspecting, still war-defiant nation. Suddenly a soaring business has taken off of nuclear shelter sales in Japan.

In Taiwan, in a 24-hour-period, 71 Chinese military aircraft. among them fighter jets and drones, entered Taiwan's air defence zone, to date the largest reported incursion. The Taiwan Straits saw 43 aircraft cross the median line, the unofficial buffer separating the two sides. Throughout the steady increase of aggressive intimidation that Beijing tqrgets Taipei with, this is yet the most emphatic. According to Beijing these were 'strike drills'.

Beijing was merely responding to 'provocations' from Taiwan and the United States. The latter intervening in territory not its own, the former spurning Beijing's wish for reunifiction, to take independent sovereign Taiwan back under its wing. The drills saw the Chinese air force dispatch warplanes from several locales across the country for simulated attacks on Taiwanese and U.S. warships. 

The situation has compelled Taiwan to change the service tenure of its compulsory military service from the current four months to a year, to deal with rising tensions linked to Beijing's military pressure. Taiwan's southern air defence identification zone saw Chinese electronic-warfare and antisubmarine aircraft incursions along with drones. Repeated missions by the Chinese air force of the last two years has given Taipei reason for vigilance. In response to the latest incursion, Taiwan sent combat aircraft to warn off the Chinese planes, with missile systems monitoring their flight.

Communication Between Pets and Owners By Telepathy

"If I had someone who wanted me to listen to their pet psychic [then] I would have pooh-poohed it. In the last five to seven years, I’m not really skeptical any more."

"I had a cat who was having a breathing problem and the owner spoke to an animal communicator, who said the cat needed acupuncture."

"Animals are very empathetic and can pick up on their owners’ feelings,:

"When I first started vet school everyone thought acupuncture was voodoo medicine; now it’s very accepted by mainstream veterinarians. I think in the future we might find there is something to psychic medication."

Dr Aleda Cheng, New Jersey-based veterinarian

 

"People want company, but they don't necessarily want to raise a child."

"The cost of owning a pet is a lot less than raising a child."

Ariel Hu, telepathic communicator, course teacher on talking to animals

 

Pet psychics are growing in number and popularity. They are people who undergo training sessions to prepare them to become more sensitive to the fact that people have telepathic capabilities, they just have to be guided toward understanding the power they have and how to use them. A powerful incentive is speaking to the dead, the dearly departed, to communicate with them and to find solace and peace in the knowledge that this can be done, once the subconscious powers of telepathy have been unleashed. 

 

Animal pets now have their very own psychic consultants, those who specialize as intermediaries acting on behalf of the pet owner, the human companion of a dog or a cat or any other pet; all have the capacity to communicate with the assistance of a skilled intermediary. Their owners find comfort in the assurance that with the help of these pet communicators, a long-mourned dead cat or dog can be reached and asked questions about their well-being, for example, and whether when they return to life they would want to meet again.

 

Taiwan has become the centralized location of more pet telepathic professionals than anywhere else on the planet. Some attribute this to Daoism and Buddhism with the cardinal belief in reincarnation and the life of spirits. Many others may consider that this is a way to deal with grief when a beloved animal dies, leaving the pet owner bereft of its constant companionship. According to experts a plausible explanation lies in the fact that the belief in telepathy is an urban, middle-class phenomenon fed by a sense of isolation.

During this time of a global pandemic and the need to exercise social distancing, masking, avoiding physical interaction with others and any exposure to the SARS-CoV-2 virus causing COVID-19, people are more anxious, unsettled and unhappy than ever before. With a companion, depression can be set aside, and a growing number of Taiwanese have adopted pets for company and the sharing of a physical space. 

In Taiwan, the growing body of in-demand pet telepathy experts -- or as they prefer to call themselves, animal communicators -- this cottage industry has grown in demand in lock-step with the expanding number of new pet-owners in the island state. The Taiwan Animal Communication Center sees new classes of students graduating every few months. They maintain a roster of over 80 certified professionals whose expertise can be hired out.

Other animal communicators have been trained at home by other teachers, or even overseas, including in the United States and Britain where the movement toward pet telepathy first emerged. Nowhere, however, has the movement attained the popularity it has in Taiwan; to the extent that it can take months to reserve an appointment with the most in-demand pet communicators. "There are more communicators per capita in Taiwan than anywhere else I've seen", observed Lauren McCall, a British-American animal communicator who operates student workshops in Taiwan.

 

In the past ten years there has been a steady rise in pet ownership with registered dogs and cat ownerships peaking at 2.5 million in 2017, close to double the numbers in 2005. Taiwan reported 2.3 million dogs and cats in 2019, rates out-numbering those of children under age 15 in five counties. Dogs can be seen carted about in strollers in Taipei. Businesses offering massages or swim classes and yoga for dogs have no difficulty finding clients.

Funerals can be arranged for departed animals with monks officiating, chanting last rites complete with ceremonial joss paper burning to enable their spirits to live well in the afterlife. Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen has two cats and three dogs, all of which were featured in her pre-election campaign last year, and remain part of public relations, helping raise her popularity level. A pet communicator was also one of the president's campaign managers.

Taiwanese seem to have lost their enthusiasm for having children, replacing them instead with adopting animal pets, citing rising living expenses, a lag in wages and living in densely populated cities. All of which gave Taiwan a shrinking population for the first time on record, in 2020. As more animals enter households, their owners turn to communicators where services such as finding lost pets or divining the relationship between owner and pet in a past life, are all available.

And it is not only dogs and cats  that are communicated with on behalf of their owners, but also pet hedgehogs, birds, turtles, dolphins and ... plants.

"The IAABC is an evidence-based organization promoting best practices in animal behavior and training. While we understand that belief-based practices inspire passion and conviction in some people, there is no scientifically verified evidence that these methods are based on anything more than faith."

"[Pet psychics may seem harmless, but] belief-based practices can lead clients and practitioners to see change and improvement where there is none, potentially causing harm to the animal."

Marjie Alonso, executive director of the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants

Pilot Indiscretion Threatens Taiwanese New Year's Celebrations

“The local infection involves a woman in her 30s."

"Wear your masks well and let's not fumble this now, especially when we're in a period with a mutation that's transmitting fast."

"We need to have stricter controls for pilots."

"We're definitely going in the direction of stricter."

Taiwanese health minister Chen Shih-chung 

 

"EVA Air has always abided by the government's epidemic prevention policies, and most crew members also followed the epidemic prevention regulations."

"However, the behaviour of an individual employee has undermined everyone's efforts at epidemic prevention."

EVA Air statement

The pilot worked for Taiwanese international airline EVA Air. Photo: 123RF

So much for diligent attention to protecting borders and convincing residents to observe social distancing rules, hand-hygiene, and scrupulous surface-cleansing, country-wide COVID testing and contact-tracing leading to an astounding success in controlling the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19that has devastated Europe and North America, earning Taiwan great admiration and respect on the world stage for its vanishingly low infection rate and deaths attributable to COVID. 

 

A country acknowledged for its role-model status leading the world in containment of COVID is now prepared to roll back foreign flights into the country while tightening quarantine requirements for passenger crew members. That state of affairs in response to the appearance of the first locally transmitted coronavirus case since early spring. A 60-year-old New Zealander cargo pilot who works for Taiwanese EVA Air, decided to hide his virus symptoms and get on with work as usual.

Now, not only has he been tested positive for COVID, two work colleagues, also pilots, have also tested positive for COVID, as has a woman who had been in contact with the pilot. That's for starters. Contact tracing is carrying on to ensure that anyone who had been in close proximity to any of the infected individuals is not also carrying the virus. That the unidentified, and now former employer of the airline was coughing during his last flight but wore no mask, gave rise to a public debate.

The nation's pride in its accomplishment in besting COVID-19 has suffered a blow. It can no longer claim success in stifling domestic transmission, as it has done for  253 days. Immediate steps have been taken by Taiwanese government authorities to cut passenger flights from London by half, starting Wednesday, over the fear of the potential of importing the new virus variant recently widespread in Britain. Taiwanese citizens -- all 23 million -- are fuming over lax controls of pilots from abroad.

 

The public, anticipating public New Year celebrations, is now preparing for new regulations that may impact on that treasured tradition. The pilot, hospitalized for treatment, has been fined the maximum under the law of $10,000, coinciding with his very recent loss of employment for the Taiwanese airliner. What has occurred through a single case of neglect underlines how convenient it is for the coronavirus to muster a foothold even in countries where public health authorities had been diligent in its control.

 

Taiwan has reported its first local coronavirus case in 253 days. Photo: AP

 

China, Australia and now Taiwan stand as living examples of what can and will occur if and when that diligence is temporarily lifted, deliberately or by default or accident. All the quarantine regulations, isolation and contact-tracing, along with a public willing to sacrifice to deny the coronavirus an opportunity, collapsed as a result of one casual error in personal judgement. Authorities in Taiwan are now turning their close attention to flight crew members on occasion given more relaxed quarantine requirements.

 

Arriving pilots go into quarantine for three days while cabin-crew members quarantine for five. Newly instituted regulations with the intention of disrupting the coronavirus's newly-enabled foothold will see the isolation period increased to 14 days. In Australia, agencies imposed strict quarantines for hotels following a dozen Chilean crew members caught partying in a layover in Sydney. Authorities in Taiwan believe the New Zealander pilot normally based in Taiwan, on returning from a trip to the U.S. on December 4, met a friend with whom he went about to a number of different venues. 

 

The $10,000 fine struck against the pilot was for "covering up symptoms, contacts, and places visited while sick". Premier Su Tseng-chang and other Taiwanese officials now urge their citizens to think about remaining at home during New Year's celebrations, while public events remain scheduled. "You can get better angles from television", urged Premier Su in reference to the annual fireworks show at the Taipei 101 skyscraper. 

 

Taiwan News Photo