Taiwan and its friends in the US should help US president-elect Donald Trump’s administration improve its knowledge of the geostrategic importance of Taiwan to any US policy toward Asia and exercise greater care in enunciating the US’ position toward Taiwan, former American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) director William Stanton said in an article published on Wednesday.
In the article titled “What should US policy toward Taiwan be under the Trump administration?” Stanton said that Taiwan should take advantage of the election of Trump, whom he called a very unorthodox US president, to help change Washington’s policy toward Taiwan.
Stanton said in the article, published by the Washington-based Taiwan affairs think tank Global Taiwan Institute, that what troubles him most is Trump’s lack of attention to Asia, while his candidates for national security adviser and CIA director appear to have no experience or interest in Asia.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times
This continues the long tradition of US presidents whose foreign policy officials knew nothing about Asia, Taiwan or China, he said.
Stanton added that the new US government should enunciate its policy toward Taiwan by avoiding the frequent, misleading, shorthand references to the US’ “one China” policy, which is usually misinterpreted to mean Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan.
Instead, he said, the new US administration should — like China — simply repeat the carefully crafted language of the 1979 communique: “The Government of the United States of America acknowledges the Chinese position that there is but one China and Taiwan is part of China.”
However, it should also reiterate key points from the July 1982 “six assurances,” which stipulate that the US would not alter its position about the sovereignty of Taiwan, which is that the question is one to be decided peacefully by Chinese themselves, and would not pressure Taiwan to enter into negotiations with China, and that the US would not formally recognize Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan, he said.
The US government also needs to frequently repeat some of the actual language in the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA), Stanton said.
The Trump administration should show greater flexibility in allowing Taiwan’s representatives to meet with US officials on a more regular basis and at a higher level, he said.
Washington lawyers have created most of the self-imposed restrictions on official Taiwan travel and contact, in an overly zealous effort to show that Washington has broken diplomatic relations with the Republic of China.
The Trump administration should more aggressively pursue support for Taiwan’s participation in international organizations, Stanton said.
The Trump administration should also welcome negotiations with Taiwan on a bilateral free-trade agreement and should reiterate and then act on the 1979 commitments in the TRA to provide Taiwan with arms “to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability” and to further bolster military cooperation and provide technical assistance to Taiwan’s indigenous weapons development programs, Stanton added.
In another institute article, former AIT director Stephen Young said that the new US administration should continue providing defensive weapons to Taiwan and reaffirm Washington’s commitment to the three joint communiques of 1972, 1978 and 1982, and to the “one China” policy.
Young also recommended that a US Cabinet-level official review bilateral economic relations and employ existing mechanisms with the Taiwan-US Trade and Investment Framework Agreement to keep the dialogue going on a range of trade issues.
A subsidiary of a Hong Kong-based company that has lost control of two critical ports on the Panama Canal said it is seeking US$2 billion of compensation in damages from Panama over its “illegal” takeover of the ports. Panama Ports Co, a unit of Hong Kong’s CK Hutchison Holdings (長江和記實業), on Friday said in a statement that it is demanding the sum under international arbitration proceedings that it had already started. The Panamanian government last week seized control of the Balboa and Cristobal ports on each end of the Panama Canal, after the country’s Supreme Court declared earlier that a concession allowing
DETERRENCE: With 1,000 indigenous Hsiung Feng II and III missiles and 400 Harpoon missiles, the nation would boast the highest anti-ship missile density in the world With Taiwan wrapping up mass production of Hsiung Feng II and III missiles by December and an influx of Harpoon missiles from the US, Taiwan would have the highest density of anti-ship missiles in the world, a source said yesterday. Taiwan is to wrap up mass production of the indigenous anti-ship missiles by the end of year, as the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology has been meeting production targets ahead of schedule, a defense official with knowledge of the matter said. Combined with the 400 Harpoon anti-ship missiles Taiwan expects to receive from the US by 2028, the nation would have
POSSIBILITIES EMERGE: With Taiwan’s victory and Japan’s narrow win over Australia, Taiwan now have a chance to advance if South Korea also beat the Aussies Taiwan has high hopes that the national baseball team would advance to the World Baseball Classic (WBC) quarter-finals after clinching a crucial 5-4 victory over South Korea in a nail-biting extra-inning game at the Tokyo Dome yesterday. Boosted by three home runs — two solo shots by Yu Chang (張育成) and Cheng Tsung-che (鄭宗哲) and a two-run homer by Stuart Fairchild — the triumph gave Taiwan a much-needed second victory in the five-team Pool C, where only the top two finishers would advance to the knockout stage in Miami, Florida. Entering extra innings with the game tied at four apiece, Taiwan scored
MISSION OF PEACE: The foreign minister urged Beijing to respect Taiwan’s existence as an independent nation, and work together to ensure peace and stability in the region Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) yesterday rejected Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi’s (王毅) comments about Taiwan, criticizing China as a “troublemaker” in the international community and a disruptor of cross-strait peace. Speaking at a news conference on the sidelines of the Chinese National People’s Congress, Wang said that Taiwan has always been a territory of China and that it would be impossible for it to become its own country. The “return” of Taiwan to China was the natural outcome of the Chinese people’s resistance against Japan in World War II, and that any pursuit of independence was “doomed
RSS