NANGAN, Taiwan: In the past month, bed-and-breakfast owner Chen Yu-lin had to tell his guests that he could not provide them with the Internet. Others living in Taiwan's Matsu Islands, a group of outlying islands closer to neighbouring China, had to struggle with paying electricity bills, making a doc
NANGAN, Taiwan: In the past month, bed-and-breakfast owner Chen Yu-lin had to tell his guests that he could not provide them with the Internet.
The first cable was severed by a Chinese fishing vessel about 50km out at sea. Six days later, on Feb 8, a Chinese cargo ship cut the second, according to Chunghwa Telecom, Taiwan's largest service provider and owner of the cables. For connecting to the outside world, the Matsu Islands' 14,000 residents rely on two submarine Internet cables leading to Taiwan's main island.
Some experts suspect that China may have cut the cables deliberately as part of its harassment of the self-ruled island it considers part of its territory, to be reunited by force if necessary. An antiquated 40mm anti-air gun points towards the sea at an observation deck on Beigan, part of Taiwan's Matsu Islands, on Mar 5, 2023.
Despite the protection, cables can get cut quite easily by ships and their anchors, or fishing boats using steel nets.
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