A flagging moment for Taiwanese cabin crew’s morale

TAIWAN’S foreign ministry said yesterday that it had protested to Dubai-based airline Emirates over reports that the carrier asked Taiwanese cabin crew to stop wearing the flag of the selfruled island on their uniforms, under pressure from Beijing.

Screen shots of an internal e-mail purportedly sent to Emirates staff circulated online this week, telling cabin crew to use the Chinese flag instead of Taiwanese flag pins.

The directive was linked to a demand from the Chinese government, the e-mail said.

China regards Taiwan as a renegade province after defeated nationalists fled there in 1949.

Beijing has not ruled out the use of force to bring the self-governed island under its control.

Taiwan’s foreign ministry said its Dubai representative had protested to Emirates. “A few hours later the company e-mailed to apologise, and said the request was not correct and was not appropriate, but it still asked Taiwanese crew members to not wear any flag badge, including our flag,” the ministry said.

Emirates is not ordering its Taiwanese crew to wear China’s flag badge, the ministry said.

Emirates did not comment directly, but said an internal e-mail on Tuesday told cabin crew to remove a flag pin from their uniforms and replace it with another. – Reuters