Vice President Annette Lu (
Ministry spokesman Richard Shih (石瑞琦) said the itinerary of the US leg before Lu's visit to El Salvador had yet to be finalized.
Local television reported Lu was due to visit Los Angeles and New York, without specifying whom she would meet.
Lu and President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) have previously met US lawmakers during their stopovers but any meeting with US government officials was considered an unlikely move that would anger Beijing.
Relations between Taipei and Washington hit a low point after Chen called a landmark referendum in March on relations with China.
The referendum plans provoked a stinging rebuke from Washington, with US President George W. Bush saying he was against any unilateral move threatening the cross-straits status quo.
Lu's trip will also take her to Guatemala and El Salvador as part of Taipei's efforts to consolidate ties with its allies as China steps up a diplomatic push in the region, Taiwan's major international support base.
Twenty-six countries, 13 of them in Latin America, recognize Taiwan.
A Chinese-language newspaper reported that the failure of Honduran President Ricardo Maduro to stop off in Taipei during his current trip to Asia and Europe shows that ties between the two are in danger.
All eyes in Taipei were on whether Maduro would meet Chinese officials in Tokyo or quietly visit Beijing, the paper reported.
But Shih denied any threat to Honduras-Taiwan ties. "Ties with Honduras remain stable," he said.
In its diplomatic tug-of-war with Taipei, Beijing made a fresh score on March 30 when China swayed Dominica.
South Korean K-pop girl group Blackpink are to make Kaohsiung the first stop on their Asia tour when they perform at Kaohsiung National Stadium on Oct. 18 and 19, the event organizer said yesterday. The upcoming performances will also make Blackpink the first girl group ever to perform twice at the stadium. It will be the group’s third visit to Taiwan to stage a concert. The last time Blackpink held a concert in the city was in March 2023. Their first concert in Taiwan was on March 3, 2019, at NTSU Arena (Linkou Arena). The group’s 2022-2023 “Born Pink” tour set a
CPBL players, cheerleaders and officials pose at a news conference in Taipei yesterday announcing the upcoming All-Star Game. This year’s CPBL All-Star Weekend is to be held at the Taipei Dome on July 19 and 20.
The Taiwan High Court yesterday upheld a lower court’s decision that ruled in favor of former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) regarding the legitimacy of her doctoral degree. The issue surrounding Tsai’s academic credentials was raised by former political talk show host Dennis Peng (彭文正) in a Facebook post in June 2019, when Tsai was seeking re-election. Peng has repeatedly accused Tsai of never completing her doctoral dissertation to get a doctoral degree in law from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) in 1984. He subsequently filed a declaratory action charging that
The Hualien Branch of the High Court today sentenced the main suspect in the 2021 fatal derailment of the Taroko Express to 12 years and six months in jail in the second trial of the suspect for his role in Taiwan’s deadliest train crash. Lee Yi-hsiang (李義祥), the driver of a crane truck that fell onto the tracks and which the the Taiwan Railways Administration's (TRA) train crashed into in an accident that killed 49 people and injured 200, was sentenced to seven years and 10 months in the first trial by the Hualien District Court in 2022. Hoa Van Hao, a