Former US president Bill Clinton met with President Chen Shui-bian (
Chen, who read through My Life before meeting with its author, hosted a dinner banquet for Clinton at the Far Eastern Plaza Hotel Sunday night and arranged a one-hour talk with Clinton at the Taipei Guest House yesterday morning.
Chen gave Clinton a saxophone as a gift at the Sunday banquet. Officials attending the dinner said both men shared their political experiences and that Clinton lauded Chen's courage to seek inter-party cooperation.
"President Chen and Clinton had a great time Sunday night, but they both felt the meeting was too short. So they decided to meet again at the Taipei Guest House Monday morning," Presidential Office Deputy Secretary-General James Huang (
Huang noted that details of the meeting between Chen and Clinton would not be disclosed. Clinton also met with Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Lien Chan (
"I found [Chen and Lien] both to be highly intelligent, completely patriotic, devoted to the interests of the people of Taiwan, and not so far apart on some issues as I thought they might be," Clinton said yesterday during an interview with the ETTV channel.
Clinton noted that the Taiwanese people elected Chen by a narrow majority and gave the opposition parties a narrow majority in the legislature.
"What they are saying is that we put you in the same boat. We want you to row and move forward and you have to compromise," he said.
Clinton, who mentioned how the world might move from interdependence to integration in his speech in Taipei on Sunday, said the relationship between China and Taiwan has a lot of similarities to the relationship between blacks and whites in the little town he grew up.
"We are all interdependent. We could not escape each other. You [Taiwan and China] should build on the positive contacts.
Clinton left for Singapore at 5pm yesterday.
Also See Story:
Clinton to Lien: Direct charter flights successful
SAFETY RISK: The government is working to categorize countries based on their COVID-19 cases and prevention efforts, which would determine quarantine periods The government plans to rank countries based on their COVID-19 risks to determine how to treat tourists and other travelers from those nations once Taiwan reopens its borders, but it is still working out the categories, a top health official told lawmakers yesterday. “We would divide countries around the world into several categories. One category would comprise those countries with very few confirmed COVID-19 cases, such as New Zealand and Palau. Travelers from the countries in this category would only need to practice self-health management,” Centers for Disease Control Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥) told a Legislative Yuan seminar hosted by
SECURITY CONCERNS: The Telecom Technology Center ran black-box tests for the Executive Yuan on devices and software from Chinese, US and South Korean firms Network devices from several Chinese manufacturers are insecure and allow personal information to be leaked, testing commissioned by the Executive Yuan has shown. A variety of devices and software, including apps, from Chinese, US and South Korean manufacturers that are used by government agencies at the central and local level were subjected to black-box testing — in which the functionality of an application is examined without knowing about its internal structure, an information-security official said yesterday on condition of anonymity. The Telecom Technology Center conducted the tests, which simulated cyberattacks, to determine their resilience to the attacks, the official said. The center
CASH BOOST: Foreign spouses with residency permits are also eligible for the coupons, which can be bought at post offices or linked to digital payment options Stimulus coupons for Taiwanese and foreign spouses with residency permits can be ordered starting on July 1 and can be used from July 15 to Dec. 31, the Executive Yuan said yesterday. Aimed at boosting domestic spending, the coupons worth NT$3,000 (US$100.04) are to cost NT$1,000. “For our consumers, this is a very good deal as they get three times as much value for their money,” Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) told a news conference in Taipei. While the coupons are to have a wide range of uses, including at department stores, restaurants, book stores, night markets, beauty and hair salons, hotels, and to
Beijing is to ease a ban on foreign airlines starting on Monday next week, changing course one day after the administration of US President Donald Trump demanded that China reopen to US airlines or face curbs on its own carriers flying passengers to the US. Foreign airlines excluded from an earlier pact would be able to operate one commercial passenger flight to China per week, the Chinese Civil Aviation Administration said. It did not name any countries or carriers, but the move opens up a chance for US airlines to return for the first time in four months. While the timing might
RSS