Taiwan makes bid to join International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)

BASSETERRE, ST. KITTS, MAY 17TH 2013 (CUOPM) – The Republic of China (Taiwan) is making a bid to gain observer status in the International Civil Aviation Authority (ICAO).

As an indispensable part of global aviation responsible for managing the heavily traveled Taipei Flight Information Region (Taipei FIR), Taiwan said it aspires to meaningfully participate in the ICAO by becoming an observer to the body’s meetings, mechanisms and activities, so as to better contribute to the safeguarding of regional and global aviation safety.

Taiwan said its FIR covers 180,000 square nautical miles and is adjacent to 4 FIRs: Fukuoka, Manila, Hong Kong and Shanghai. It is located off mainland China’s eastern seaboard between Japan and the Philippines. In 2012, The Taipei FIR provided services to nearly 1.3 million controlled flights carrying 40 million travelers entering, leaving or passing through.

Taiwan has roughly 150 scheduled flights to and from Europe, 400 to the US, 660 to Japan and over 1200 across the Taiwan Strait.

Taiwan said it is connected to 117 cities around the globe via 181 air passenger routes and 86 air freight routes.

“Yet Information on the ICAO website concerning the Taipei FIR is either lacking or inaccurate, causing confusion among foreign aviation authorities and within the international aviation transport industry. Taiwan’s exclusion from ICAO’s platform for experience and resources sharing is indeed a hurdle to ICAO’s pursuit of a seamless sky,” it said.

Taiwan has attained the goals in plenty of fields of national development and contributed to this world with her energy-saving, cooperation-promoting and peace-loving achievements.

Nonetheless, the ICAO is strongly urged to accommodate Taiwan as an observer based upon a legal basis, past practice or the need to keep aviation safety its prime concern, thus benefiting the international community in terms of regional and global civil aviation.

ICAO is a body within the United Nations and the ICAO Assembly is the Organization’s sovereign body. It meets at least once every three years and is convened by ICAO’s governing body, the Council.

The 38th Assembly will be held in Montreal, Canada from September 24th to the 4th October 2013.

ICAO’s 191 Member States and a large number of international organizations are invited to the Assembly, which establishes the worldwide policy of the Organization for the upcoming triennium.

During Assembly Sessions, ICAO’s complete work programme in the technical, economic, legal and technical cooperation fields is reviewed in detail. Assembly outcomes are then provided to the other bodies of ICAO and to its Member States in order to guide their continuing and future work, as prescribed in Article 49 of the Convention on International Civil Aviation.

Each Member State is entitled to one vote on matters before the Assembly, and decisions at these Sessions are taken by a majority of the votes cast – except where otherwise provided for in the Convention.

Constantly seeking to foster and support the sustainable growth of air transport, the International Civil Aviation Organization serves as the global forum for its 191 Member States. Amongst its many other functions supporting all aspects of international civil aviation, ICAO brings together States and key industry organizations to determine areas of strategic priority, develops policies and standards, coordinates global monitoring, analysis and reporting initiatives, and delivers targeted assistance and capacity building.