Vice President Annette Lu's (呂秀蓮) one-day delay of her trip to Gambia was due to mistakes made by foreign ministry officials, Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Hung-mao (田弘茂) said yesterday.
Lu cancelled her flight to Gambia at the last minute Tuesday evening due to what officials originally called "problems with the chartered plane linking Gambia and another destination."
Although the delay on Tuesday prompted speculation that China blocked Lu from leaving Taiwan for Africa on Tuesday, Tien in his year-end press conference yesterday had a different explanation.
"I have to admit that Lu was unable to take off last night [Tuesday] because of technical flaws on the part of some foreign ministry officials when evaluating the overall situation," Tien said.
He said the original plan was for Lu to make an overnight stopover in one country, which other sources identified as Holland, but a last-minute discovery forced the foreign ministry to drop the first option.
Tien admitted that the stopover in the country, which Tien refused to specify, once realized, "would be the first time for high-ranking officials [from Taiwan] to make a stopover in that country."
EU countries often refuse to issue visas to the five-top officials from Taiwan. The top five officials are: the president, vice president, premier, foreign minister and defense minister.
A source told the Taipei Times that the delegation led by Lu would make a brief stop in Paris, without passing through immigration, before flying to Gambia on a chartered plane.
Tien also said the foreign ministry would examine the pitfalls surrounding Lu's trip in order to prevent similar mistakes from happening again.
Earlier in the press conference, Tien held up a 31-page account of the foreign ministry's efforts since Nov. 1 to negotiate with other countries while arranging Lu's trip to Gambia in an apparent move to demonstrate the ministry's concern.
"[The process] can't be described in one or two simple statements such as how much the foreign ministry has tried to do its best," Tien said.
"If one day these materials are de-classified, then everybody will know that I thought this process had no dignity," Tien added.
Among countries that do not have any diplomatic ties with Taiwan, "the US has shown us the utmost goodwill compared to others as far as overseas visits by high-ranking officials from Taiwan are concerned," Tien said.
Lu and the delegation departed for Western Europe late last night and are scheduled to reach the West African nation around noon today.
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