Taiwan will express deep concern to Japan if Japanese authorities interfere with Taiwanese civilian aircraft flying through an area where the two countries' air identification zones overlap, an official said Tuesday.
"If our Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) notifies us of such a case, we will immediately hold serious consultations with Japan" and ask it to refrain from such actions, said Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Anna Kao at a news conference Tuesday.
Kao's remarks came a day after CAA Director-General Jean Shen revealed that civilian aircraft from Taiwan had been harassed by Japan's Air Self-Defense Force in an area where the air identification zones of the two countries overlap.
Shen said the CAA notified the Foreign Ministry of the incidents.
Asked on Tuesday how many such cases were reported to the ministry, Kao said she did not have the information on hand, but stressed there have been no such cases so far this year.
In 2009, 15 Taiwanese flights flying on an air route designated B591, which stretches from Taipei to northeastern China through the overlapping zones, were intercepted by Japanese defense aircraft, Shen said later Monday, citing CAA information.
Between September 2010 and April 2011, 17 Taiwanese civilian aircraft met with interference from radio waves from the Japan Air Self-Defense Force, she said, and similar incidents occurred between April and March 2012.
The incidents occurred in the area where Japan's air defense identification zone (ADIZ) and Taiwan's flight information zone overlap, between 123 degrees and 124 degrees longitude. In consideration of the difficulty presented for Taiwanese planes in reaching a level altitude before entering Japan's ADIZ, the ICAO moved the eastern part of Taiwan's flight information region one degree to 124 degrees east in 1955 — which happened to be inside Japan's air defense identification zone
The issue was made public when Shen first revealed the Japanese interference at a hearing held by the Legislature's Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee on Monday discussing China's recent demarcation of its own ADIZ in the East China Sea.
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