The situation, however, is now changing, the business leader said.
“China’s economic importance to Taiwan has soared and that relationship will soon be formalized in a free-trade agreement,” Hammond-Chambers said.
“Meanwhile, America’s increasing inability to maintain a credible and consistent security commitment undermines Taiwan’s confidence in our resolve. Couple that with our ‘on again, off again’ trade policy and we are doing a great deal to undermine broader US interests in the market,” Hammond-Chambers said
Citing a Financial Times report, Hammond-Chambers said that Minister of Foreign Affairs Timothy Yang (楊進添) had told legislators that “ it was the government’s understanding that ‘there is a certain interaction’ between the beef ban and future US arms sales to Taiwan.”
Hammond-Chambers, however, said that if this were true, “this sort of linkage directly violates the Taiwan Relations Act, which clearly states that ‘the [US] president and the Congress shall determine the nature and quantity of such defense articles and services based solely upon their judgment of the [defense] needs of Taiwan.’”
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) has instructed his government to use every power possible to attempt to minimize any damaging impact on Taiwan’s relations with the US that the lawmakers’ decision could have.
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