Taiwan's armed forces plan to garrison a newly raised military police battalion in south Taipei, as part of efforts to bolster protection for the president and other top government leaders, a military source told CNA Monday.
The unit will be the sixth military police battalion under the 202nd Military Police Command stationed in Taipei but the specific location of the garrison has not yet been decided, the source said.
Unlike many other countries, Taiwan's military police are a separate branch of the armed forces tasked with protecting government leaders from assassination or capture, guarding strategic facilities, and conducting counterintelligence against enemy infiltrators, spies, and saboteurs.
The arrangement comes after a military source told CNA in April that Taiwan may double the number of its military police in the coming years for the same purpose as China intensifies its threat to the regional stability across the Taiwan Strait.
Currently, around 5,000 of the 210,000 troops in Taiwan's armed forces are military police, a number that the source said is set to double to 10,000 pending central government approval.
Five military police battalions are currently garrisoned in Taipei, including the 211th and the 332nd, responsible for protecting the president and the vice president, respectively, as well as armored and artillery units stationed in the northern part of the city.
