Taiwan signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Haiti over a US$15.8 million (NT$472 million) donation to post-earthquake reconstruction efforts when the upcoming visit by President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to Taiwan’s Caribbean ally was being arranged, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed on Friday.
The memorandum was signed by Ambassador to Haiti Liu Bang-zyh (劉邦治) and Haitian Chancellor Pierre-Richard Casimir on July 9, the ministry said.
Under the MOU, which had gone largely unnoticed, Taiwan commits to donate US$15.8 million for a new building housing the Court of Cassation, Haiti’s highest judicial body, Florencia Hsieh (謝妙宏), deputy director-general of the Department of Latin American and Caribbean Affairs, said by telephone on Friday.
Hsieh said Ma and Haitian President Michel Martelly will preside over a ceremony to commemorate the laying of the building’s first stone in Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince.
Ma is to arrive in Haiti on Tuesday on the first leg of a five-nation tour, which includes Paraguay, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Saint Kitts and Nevis.
The president will also make transit stops en route to Haiti and on his way back to Taiwan in New York and Los Angeles respectively.
The project will be carried out by the Panama-based Overseas Engineering & Construction Co (OECC) and is to be completed in 24 months, Hsieh said.
The OECC is a subsidiary of the Overseas Investment & Development Corp, a Taiwanese incorporation of major public and private enterprises, groups and financial institutions established by the late banking magnate Jeffrey Koo Sr (辜濂松) in response to the government’s call to assist in overseas public infrastructure projects to enhance relations with the nation’s allies.
The project is to be funded from a budget allocated for foreign assistance programs and payments will be provided progressively over the course of the construction in direct relation to how much work has been completed, Hsieh said.
According to the ministry’s budget statement this year, the budget allocation for such programs in all 12 of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies in Latin America and the Caribbean stood at NT$3.4 billion, in addition to NT$440 million allotted for confidential expenses in the region.
The court project came up during discussions held between the two countries on what Taiwan could do to continue to help earthquake victims in Haiti after the completion of several humanitarian relief projects to provide vocational training, medical care and education, Hsieh said.
Three years after the earthquake, hundreds of thousands of people continue to suffer its effects. According to UNICEF, about 357,785 people — 138,000 of whom are children — are still living in crowded temporary settlements, are dependent on aid and are at a higher risk of exposure to abuse and exploitation.
In January, UNICEF requested US$11.65 million to meet its annual humanitarian goals to tackle the prolonged displacement, persistent cholera epidemic and food insecurity plaguing Haiti, problems that were all augmented by Hurricane Sandy last year.
Ma is to become the first Republic of China (ROC) president to visit Haiti since the two countries established diplomatic ties in 1956.
First lady Chow Mei-ching (周美青) visited the Caribbean country when she participated in efforts by NGOs to provide humanitarian aid to the country in August 2010.
During former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) tenure in office from 2000 to 2008, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration made several failed attempts to have Chen visit Haiti, including a last-ditch effort by then-minister of foreign affairs James Huang (黃志芳) in December 2007, a source familiar with the situation said.
The source said that the most difficult barrier to realizing Chen’s visits was the possibility that it would provoke an angry response from China, which as a permanent member of the UN Security Council has the power to veto continuing the deployment of UN peacekeeping troops in Haiti. The country relies heavily on the UN force to maintain public order and security.
In 2006, then-premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌), who had been designated as Chen’s special envoy to attend the inauguration of then-Haitian president Rene Preval, was scheduled to depart from Taiwan on May 12, but Taipei was told by Haiti on April 29 that the trip had to be canceled.
If Ma pays a high-profile visit to Haiti, it could be depicted as a vindication of his policy of rapprochement with China, said Antonio Hsiang (向駿), director of Center of Latin American Studies at Chihlee Institute of Technology.
However, a former official with the previous DPP administration, who wished to remain anonymous, held a different view.
China has not been the only factor behind Chen’s failure to visit Haiti, nor was it the only factor contributing to the success or failure of Ma’s planned visit to Haiti, he said.
“The instability in Haiti at the time [of Chen’s administration] was causing security problems in arranging the visit, while the 2010 earthquake and ensuing humanitarian aid delivered by Taiwan to Haiti have made it more justifiable to arrange a presidential visit to Haiti,” he said.
A signaling system malfunction disrupted high-speed rail (HSR) services beginning at 8am today, with trains temporarily reduced to three northbound and three southbound trains per hour as authorities conduct inspections. The malfunction occurred on a section of track in Miaoli County during pre-operation checks early this morning, forcing northbound and southbound trains to use a single track, the HSR operator said. The regular schedule has been replaced with three hourly trains offering only nonreserved seating in each direction, stopping at every station, it said, adding that business class cars would still have reserved seating. Departures from terminal stations are scheduled at the top
DRONE CENTRAL: Taiwan aims to become Asia’s democratic hub for drones, with most exports focused on high-quality military-grade models, an official said Taiwan’s drone industry is expected to expand significantly by 2030, producing 100,000 units per month and exporting half of them, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Current drone production capacity is about 15,000 units per month, but the industry can quickly scale up as demand increases, Industrial Development Administration Director-General Chiou Chyou-huey (邱求慧) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s drone output grew 2.5-fold last year to NT$12.9 billion (US$408.3 million) under a government program to develop the uncrewed vehicle sector, he said. The Executive Yuan in October last year approved plans to invest NT$44.2 billion into domestic production of uncrewed aerial
VERBOSE VESSELS: A CGA cutter and a China Coast Guard exchanged verbal barbs for more than a day in Taiwanese-controlled waters before the Chinese vessel left The Taiwanese and Chinese coast guards had a standoff near the strategically located Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the north of the South China Sea, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The two sides engaged in intense radio exchanges over sovereignty claims during the 33-hour standoff. China Coast Guard vessel 3501 eventually left the restricted waters, 26.6 nautical miles (49.2km) west of the Pratas Islands, at 5pm yesterday, the CGA said. Lying approximately between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Taiwan-controlled Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance — more than
WARNING: China should stop engaging in actions that undermine regional peace and stability, as it would only build resentment among people across the Strait, the CGA said China has deployed more than 100 navy, coast guard and other vessels in waters from the Yellow Sea to the South China Sea and the western Pacific since US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) met in Beijing, National Security Council Secretary-General Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said yesterday. “In this part of the world, #China is the one & only PROBLEM wrecking the #StatusQuo & threatening regional peace & stability,” Wu wrote on X. In a separate post, he said Beijing was coercing Taiwan’s maritime domain, calling it illegal and provocative, after the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) expelled a
RSS