TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The U.S. Navy sailed near the Paracel Islands in the South China Sea on Sunday (Nov. 26) to challenge what it called “unlawful restrictions” imposed by Taiwan, Vietnam, and China who claim sovereignty in the region.
The commander of the U.S. 7th Fleet released a statement on Sunday and said that the three countries’ respective claims on the Paracel Islands and associated restrictions on free passage are illegal under international law.
“By engaging in innocent passage without giving prior notification to or asking permission from any of the claimants, the United States challenged these unlawful restrictions imposed by the PRC (People’s Republic of China), Taiwan, and Vietnam,” the statement said.
Taiwan claims multiple islands in the Paracel group, but is not in control of any. All are under Chinese control, and are subject to multiple countries’ sovereignty claims.
Perhaps, before you immediately jump to conclusions, you keep your mind open and actually click the link. Because then you’d realize that you’re actually utterly wrong.
The title is pulled directly from the article, which is a decent practice that shows transparency and a lack of user-imposed bias.
And to see if this is propaganda, let’s look at the source. You don’t even have to click the link to see that this is an article from Taiwan News.
But since a name alone doesn’t disprove bias, I took an entire minute worth of time to look into its history and editorial position. Turns out this Taiwanese Newspaper has a majority stakeholder called I-Mei Foods, a Taiwanese company that’s been around for almost a century. Ever since they bought into the newspaper in the 90s, their political affiliation is pan-green. You know, the people that want Taiwan to remain as Taiwan.
And this isn’t even getting into the article itself, which is pretty neutral on it’s own. Other users have already shared good info on its contents, I recommend reading their perspectives, too.
So maybe, before you instantly dismiss something, maybe pull your head out of your ass and actually read more than a headline.