Taiwan offers to help China to deal with the new Covid-19 outbreak

Taipei: Taiwan has once again offered to help China to overcome the surge in Covid-19 cases. Victor Wang, Head of Taiwan's Central Epidemic Command Centre, told the official Central News Agency that an email was sent to the Chinese government this week.

Wang said the department asked how Taiwan can help with the surge of Covid-cases. He added that in early December also Taiwan sent an email to China to "remind" them about a community outbreak. Health Minister Hsueh Jui-yuan also said Taiwan can offer medication or vaccines to China but it is not clear if Beijing will accept it, reported Reuters.

In the New Year address, Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen for the first time publicly offered to help Beijing by providing "necessary assistance." She added that Chinese military activities near the island were not beneficial to peace and stability.

China has been seeing a surge in Covid-19 cases after lifting the zero-covid policy which restricted the movement of 1.4 billion people for three years. The data released by the Chinese government is in stark contrast with the unofficial reports coming from hospitals and crematoriums. Several nations and the UN are concerned about the reliability of the data. Taiwan and China have been repeatedly disagreeing over their respective measures to deal with the pandemic.

The Chinese government claims that Taiwan is its territory. The island nation strongly objects saying China never governed the territory and has no claim over it. Beijing considers Taiwan's democratically-elected government's President Tsai Ing-wen as a separatist and has not communicated with either since Wen took office in 2016.

China has also repeatedly demonstrated air force missions near Taiwan for the past three years. This has forced Taiwan to be on its guard. The island nation's government continues to insist that only its people can decide their own future.