The Associated Press (AP) should apologize and correct a story whose headline suggested President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said that China had approved Taiwan’s participation in the World Health Assembly (WHA) meeting, the deputy foreign minister said.
“The AP story’s headline reads: ‘Taiwan president: China approves island WHO role.’ This is totally untrue, therefore the Presidential Office should ask AP to run a correction and AP should apologize to the government,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrew Hsia (夏立言) told reporters on Friday.
On Wednesday, Department of Health Minister Yeh Ching-chuan (葉金川) said he received a fax from WHO Director-General Margaret Chan (陳馮富珍) on Tuesday night inviting Taiwan to attend the annual assembly this month under the name “Chinese Taipei.”
It will be the first time Taiwan has attended a meeting of a UN specialized agency since the Republic of China forfeited its UN membership in 1971.
Ma held a news conference on Wednesday to break the news, saying participation in this year’s WHA was a result of Taiwan’s perseverance, China’s goodwill and support from the international community.
Ma lauded improvements in cross-strait ties and the building of mutual trust.
Government Information Office Minister Su Jun-pin (蘇俊賓) yesterday said AP should improve the quality of its reporting.
He said the original AP report had been cited by local media and that resulting damage to the government “was not minor.”
“To be honest, we were very troubled by the report … We think that such a professional news outlet should demand its news coverage achieve a certain quality,” Su said.
AP has not responded to the government’s demand. On Friday, Peter Enav, the report’s author and head of AP’s Taiwan bureau, declined to comment when contacted by the Taipei Times.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday reiterated that Taiwan’s accession to the WHA as an observer was the result of direct consultation with the WHO and not via Beijing.
But the Central News Agency (CNA) on Thursday quoted WHO spokesman Thomas Abraham as saying that the WHO had no involvement whatsoever in negotiations and that the director-general issued the invitation to Taiwan only after she was notified of the outcome of cross-strait negotiations.
“The ministry is still assessing the CNA report. But I can boldly say the arrangement was not made under Beijing’s dictate and that the diligent efforts of many supporters of Taiwan in the international community have been a crucial factor,” ministry spokesman Henry Chen (陳銘政) said.
Additional reporting by Jenny W. Hsu and Shih Hsiu-chuan
Rainfall is expected to become more widespread and persistent across central and southern Taiwan over the next few days, with the effects of the weather patterns becoming most prominent between last night and tomorrow, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Independent meteorologist Daniel Wu (吳德榮) said that based on the latest forecast models of the combination of a low-pressure system and southwesterly winds, rainfall and flooding are expected to continue in central and southern Taiwan from today to Sunday. The CWA also warned of flash floods, thunder and lightning, and strong gusts in these areas, as well as landslides and fallen
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
SOUTH CHINA SEA? The Philippine president spoke of adding more classrooms and power plants, while skipping tensions with China over disputed areas Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday blasted “useless and crumbling” flood control projects in a state of the nation address that focused on domestic issues after a months-long feud with his vice president. Addressing a joint session of congress after days of rain that left at least 31 dead, Marcos repeated his recent warning that the nation faced a climate change-driven “new normal,” while pledging to investigate publicly funded projects that had failed. “Let’s not pretend, the people know that these projects can breed corruption. Kickbacks ... for the boys,” he said, citing houses that were “swept away” by the floods. “Someone has
‘CRUDE’: The potential countermeasure is in response to South Africa renaming Taiwan’s representative offices and the insistence that it move out of Pretoria Taiwan is considering banning exports of semiconductors to South Africa after the latter unilaterally downgraded and changed the names of Taiwan’s two representative offices, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. On Monday last week, the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation unilaterally released a statement saying that, as of April 1, the Taipei Liaison Offices in Pretoria and Cape Town had been renamed the “Taipei Commercial Office in Johannesburg” and the “Taipei Commercial Office in Cape Town.” Citing UN General Assembly Resolution 2758, it said that South Africa “recognizes the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole