The Mainland Affairs Council (
Tsao on Sunday led a small delegation of Matsu officials to the Chinese coastal town of Mawei, located 60km from Taiwan's tiny military outpost, to sign an agreement with local officials strengthening economic and personal exchanges between the two sides (加強民間交流與合作協議).
Under the "small three links" (
The council released a statement yesterday saying that although it had not authorized the move, it approved of Tsao's actions as they "were a people-to-people initiative to promote the `small three links.'" Indeed, Tsao asserted that as a private undertaking there was no need to seek the approval of the council, which charts the government's China policy, saying only the approval of the Chinese side to the agreement was required.
The statement stressed that it agreed to Tsao's position that he had taken the step as a representative of Matsu and not as an authorized representative of the government to help bolster ties. "The agreement was unofficial and non-governmental," said the council. "Any negotiations and their outcomes must be authorized by the council for them to have legal bearing," it said.
Council Chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen (
"This kind of spontaneous interaction between the two sides are not considered official and therefore have no legal bearing," Tsai said.
However, Tsai stressed that official negotiations on cross-strait trade matters must be conducted by the central government unless it authorizes other parties to do so on its behalf.
Besides media speculation on whether Tsao's actions usurped the authority of the central government, signing of the agreement further generated headlines due to its taking place under the "one China" banner.
But Tsao dismissed suggestions of a cave-in to the "one China" which the new government refuses to recognize. "The principle has long been part of the nation's constitution and many agreements signed between private groups across the strait are done so under this principle," Tsao said.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to