The Taiwan military on Friday warned against Taiwan's plan to open direct air links with China, saying it will weaken Taipei's defence against an attack from China, according to dpa. The Defence Ministry made the warning to incoming president Ma Ying-jeou Thursday when Ma visited the ministry for a defence briefing and instructed the ministry to prepare for the opening of air links with China, the ministry said in a statement. In the statement, the ministry said opening air links with China would shorten the Taiwan Air Force's reaction time, expose the air force's weakness and create a loophole in air surveillance, so it "definitely will affect Taiwan's air defence." However, the Defence Ministry said it would cooperate with the government and Civil Aeronautics Administration by drawing up a plan for opening links. While boosting Taiwan's air defence, the ministry would step up its war preparedness and training, and would work out countermeasures to prevent China using planes to send troops to attack Taiwan, the statement said. Ma, from the pro-China Chinese Nationalist Party, or Kuomintang (KMT), won a landslide victory in the March 22 presidential election on the platform of seeking peace with China and reviving Taiwan's faltering economy. He will be inaugurated on May 20. Ma has promised to lift the five-decade ban on direct air links with China by launching weekend tourist charter flights on July 4 and expanding that to daily tourist charter flights and eventually to regular passenger flights across the Taiwan Strait. Currently Taiwan residents and cargo going to China must transit through a third place, usually Hong Kong, causing a waste of time and increasing the cost of travel and shipments.
