A bill that seeks to encourage visits between Taiwan and the US at all levels was on Thursday passed by a US House of Representatives subcommittee in the first step toward its legislation.
The US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific unanimously passed the Taiwan travel act bill, which was initiated by US Representative Steve Chabot, and cosponsored by US representatives Brad Sherman and Ed Royce, chairman of the US House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
“The United States government should encourage visits between the United States and Taiwan at all levels,” the bill states.
Photo: AP
It says that since the enactment of the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA) in 1979, ties between Taiwan and the US have suffered from insufficient high-level communication due to the self-imposed restrictions that the US maintains on visits by high-ranking officials.
The bill, which seeks to eliminate the restrictions, is to be sent to the US House Committe on Foreign Affairs for approval.
A similar bill with the same title was also introduced to the US Senate. It was initiated by Republican senators Marco Rubio, Jim Inhofe and Cory Gardner; and Democratic senators Sherrod Brown, Bob Menendez and Gary Peters.
Before the bill can become law, it must be passed by both the House and Senate, then signed by US President Donald Trump.
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday expressed her appreciation to US officials, including US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, for their support of Taiwan.
“Over past few days, we’ve seen US officials, including SecState Tillerson, speak in support of #TaiwanRelationsAct & Taiwan-US relations,” Tsai tweeted.
Tillerson told a US House committee hearing that while the US remains committed to its “one China” policy, it fully intends to fulfill all commitments to Taiwan under the TRA.
The TRA is a US law under which the US is committed to provide Taiwan with defensive weapons.
Tsai also expressed appreciation for the subcommittee’s unanimous passage of the bill.
“Taiwan appreciates continued support of friends in US, Japan & others, & will continue to work together for peace & stability in region,” Tsai tweeted.
The US allows authoritarian Chinese leaders to visit Washington at any time and gives them a red-carpet welcome, but has shunned democratically elected leaders from its long-term friend Taiwan, Washington-based Formosan Association for Public Affairs (FAPA) president Peter Chen (陳正義) said in a news release.
Only Washington, not Beijing, has the right to decide who can visit the US, Chen said.
With relatively new governments in office in Taiwan and the US, it is an opportune time to change the rules on visits by Taiwanese officials, he said.
Taiwan is projected to lose a working-age population of about 6.67 million people in two waves of retirement in the coming years, as the nation confronts accelerating demographic decline and a shortage of younger workers to take their place, the Ministry of the Interior said. Taiwan experienced its largest baby boom between 1958 and 1966, when the population grew by 3.78 million, followed by a second surge of 2.89 million between 1976 and 1982, ministry data showed. In 2023, the first of those baby boom generations — those born in the late 1950s and early 1960s — began to enter retirement, triggering
One of two tropical depressions that formed off Taiwan yesterday morning could turn into a moderate typhoon by the weekend, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Tropical Depression No. 21 formed at 8am about 1,850km off the southeast coast, CWA forecaster Lee Meng-hsuan (李孟軒) said. The weather system is expected to move northwest as it builds momentum, possibly intensifying this weekend into a typhoon, which would be called Mitag, Lee said. The radius of the storm is expected to reach almost 200km, she said. It is forecast to approach the southeast of Taiwan on Monday next week and pass through the Bashi Channel
NO CHANGE: The TRA makes clear that the US does not consider the status of Taiwan to have been determined by WWII-era documents, a former AIT deputy director said The American Institute in Taiwan’s (AIT) comments that World War-II era documents do not determine Taiwan’s political status accurately conveyed the US’ stance, the US Department of State said. An AIT spokesperson on Saturday said that a Chinese official mischaracterized World War II-era documents as stating that Taiwan was ceded to the China. The remarks from the US’ de facto embassy in Taiwan drew criticism from the Ma Ying-jeou Foundation, whose director said the comments put Taiwan in danger. The Chinese-language United Daily News yesterday reported that a US State Department spokesperson confirmed the AIT’s position. They added that the US would continue to
The number of Chinese spouses applying for dependent residency as well as long-term residency in Taiwan has decreased, the Mainland Affairs Council said yesterday, adding that the reduction of Chinese spouses staying or living in Taiwan is only one facet reflecting the general decrease in the number of people willing to get married in Taiwan. The number of Chinese spouses applying for dependent residency last year was 7,123, down by 2,931, or 29.15 percent, from the previous year. The same census showed that the number of Chinese spouses applying for long-term residency and receiving approval last year stood at 2,973, down 1,520,
RSS