Taiwan simulates response to large scale disasters, Chinese threats

By Ann Wang and Annabelle Chih

TAINAN, Taiwan (Reuters) - Taiwan President Lai Ching-te oversaw on Thursday the first civil defence drills under his newly created social resilience committee simulating how to respond to a large-scale disaster like a tsunami or attacks on critical infrastructure.

The drill, in the southern city of Tainan, was held under the auspices of Lai's new Whole-of-Society Defence Resilience Committee, set up last year to prepare to deal with natural disasters or other emergencies such as an attack by China, which views the democratically-governed island as its own territory.

Speaking to participants after viewing some of the drills, Lai said these were the first live drills for the committee and involved around 1,500 people and there would be more next month.

"The aim is to build the resilience of the Taiwanese society to cope with large natural disasters or major accidents that cause a lot of injuries, or regional geopolitical changes. We dare not fail to prepare," he added.

"As the saying goes, prevention is better than cure and we should rely not on the likelihood of the enemy's not coming, but on our own readiness to receive him," Lai said.

"We hope that through strength, not only of the military but also the resilience of the entire society in defence, we can ensure Taiwan's security and ensure that peace can be achieved through the demonstration of our strength."

Shortly after Lai spoke, Taiwan's defence ministry said China had on Thursday held another "joint combat readiness patrol" around the island with 28 fighter jets, drones and other aircraft, as well as warships.

The Tainan drills simulated scenarios such as a tsunami after a massive offshore earthquake and "explosions" at a passenger port terminal, evacuating casualties to triage centres and setting up emergency response command posts.

Under tents, casualties were laid out on the ground and treated, as other officials used large white boards to keep track of their care and who had died or the level of injuries.

While Taiwan's military, which is at the front lines of helping deal with actual disasters like earthquakes, was not directly involved, the armed forces did lend equipment to set up outside operating theatres and other medical equipment.

Also attending and viewing the drills were the de facto U.S., European Union, Polish and Indian ambassadors to Taiwan, among other senior foreign diplomats including Britain, Singapore, Japan, Israel, Canada and Australia.

Taiwan sits on active fault lines and is frequently struck by earthquakes, and hit by typhoons, but it has well-honed disaster plans meaning casualties are generally low, though a 7.3 magnitude quake killed more than 2,000 people in 1999.

(Reporting by Ann Wang and Annabelle Chih; Writing by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Michael Perry)