Qatar strategy needed
On Monday last week, Saudi Arabia spearheaded a diplomatic assault against Qatar, cutting diplomatic ties and transport links with the state.
Although Taiwan has no representative office in Qatar, it maintains close bilateral ties with the country. For instance, an alliance of Taiwanese petrochemical companies has invested in Qatar’s largest methanol production plant and in recent years has also teamed up with Qatar to invest in plants in other Gulf states.
There are approximately 100 Taiwanese expatriates living in Qatar and a considerably higher number living in Saudi Arabia’s capital city, Riyadh.
Taiwanese expatriates working in education, commerce, engineering and the airline industry are held in high regard throughout Qatari society for their professionalism. In recent years a number of Qatari students, through the recommendation of Taiwanese teachers working at Qatari universities, have chosen Taiwan as a location for exchange study.
As Taiwan does not operate a representative office in Qatar, both Taiwanese expatriates needing to renew their passports and Qatari businessmen traveling to Taiwan have to courier documentation to Taiwan’s representative office in Saudi Arabia. This is likely to become more difficult now, while it will undoubtedly also reduce the flow of information on business opportunities for Taiwanese companies hoping to compete for large-scale infrastructure projects as Qatar prepares to stage the 2022 FIFA World Cup.
Furthermore, judging by information posted on Taiwanese travel agency Web sites, the rupturing of relations with Saudi Arabia also leaves many unanswered questions as to how Taiwanese nationals will be able to apply for visas to visit Qatar.
With many neighboring Arab countries now imposing an air blockade on Qatar, the visa application process is likely to take even longer than normal.
The government would do well to learn from Singapore. In Qatar, hotels that are rated four-star and above are permitted by the Qatari government to process visas. Compared with foreign embassies, the process is much faster and more efficient. The Singaporean government encourages Singaporean businessmen to purchase or build four-star or better hotels in Qatar and then employ young Singaporeans to work as management staff at the hotels.
In the past few years, I have traveled to Qatar on many occasions and have have come across many Singaporean managers working at hotels in Qatar who have participated in the annual Han Kuang military exercises between Singapore and Taiwan.
Through their exposure to a multitude of cultures, all the Singaporean management staff who I have met possessed a mature international outlook, as well as excellent service skills.
The government is pushing its “new southbound policy” and aims to expand business ties with the Muslim-majority countries. If, at a time when Qatar is facing a serious shock to its economy, Taiwan were to invest in the country’s tourism hotel market, not only would this further increase the feeling of goodwill in Qatar toward Taiwan in the short-term, in the medium-term it would bring in business opportunities arising from the FIFA World Cup and in the long-term it would help Taiwan to circumvent China’s “One Belt, One Road” initiative, so that Qatar functions as Taiwan’s gateway to the Persian Gulf, Iran and even the Middle East.
The multiple strategic benefits that Qatar affords certainly warrants close consideration by the government.
Kang Si-wei
Taipei
Two sets of economic data released last week by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) have drawn mixed reactions from the public: One on the nation’s economic performance in the first quarter of the year and the other on Taiwan’s household wealth distribution in 2021. GDP growth for the first quarter was faster than expected, at 6.51 percent year-on-year, an acceleration from the previous quarter’s 4.93 percent and higher than the agency’s February estimate of 5.92 percent. It was also the highest growth since the second quarter of 2021, when the economy expanded 8.07 percent, DGBAS data showed. The growth
In the intricate ballet of geopolitics, names signify more than mere identification: They embody history, culture and sovereignty. The recent decision by China to refer to Arunachal Pradesh as “Tsang Nan” or South Tibet, and to rename Tibet as “Xizang,” is a strategic move that extends beyond cartography into the realm of diplomatic signaling. This op-ed explores the implications of these actions and India’s potential response. Names are potent symbols in international relations, encapsulating the essence of a nation’s stance on territorial disputes. China’s choice to rename regions within Indian territory is not merely a linguistic exercise, but a symbolic assertion
More than seven months into the armed conflict in Gaza, the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to take “immediate and effective measures” to protect Palestinians in Gaza from the risk of genocide following a case brought by South Africa regarding Israel’s breaches of the 1948 Genocide Convention. The international community, including Amnesty International, called for an immediate ceasefire by all parties to prevent further loss of civilian lives and to ensure access to life-saving aid. Several protests have been organized around the world, including at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and many other universities in the US.
Every day since Oct. 7 last year, the world has watched an unprecedented wave of violence rain down on Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territories — more than 200 days of constant suffering and death in Gaza with just a seven-day pause. Many of us in the American expatriate community in Taiwan have been watching this tragedy unfold in horror. We know we are implicated with every US-made “dumb” bomb dropped on a civilian target and by the diplomatic cover our government gives to the Israeli government, which has only gotten more extreme with such impunity. Meantime, multicultural coalitions of US