Former US president Bill Clinton will maintain his support for the "one China" policy despite his upcoming meeting President Chen Shui-bian (
"The United States and I have not changed our positions [on the Taiwan question] ... I hope that China and Taiwan would not think that my position or the US's would change because of this trip," he told a Hong Kong newspaper group in an interview in Tokyo ahead of his two-day visit to Taiwan yesterday.
PHOTO: CHEN TSE-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
"I sincerely stand by the one-China policy ... I sincerely hope to see peace in the Taiwan Strait. At the same time I urge them both to solve their disputes peacefully," he was quoted as saying.
Clinton promised to also abide by the three joint communiques which form the basis of China-US relations and to oppose Taiwan independence.
Such views would be passed on to Chen during his visit on the country during which he would also laud the economic achievements there.
He said he believed the closer economic ties between them would help to ease cross-strait tensions.
Irritable China
Nevertheless, China was irritated by Clinton's scheduled meeting with Chen, who was viewed as a dangerous "splittist" leading Taiwan down the road toward formal independence, a move Beijing said would be regarded as an act of war.
But last week, Chen pledged not to push for the nation's formal independence after a series of peace overtures to rival China.
Clinton welcomed the softening tone in Chen's recent remarks and believed the Taiwan issue could be solved without force.
Clinton is scheduled to deliver a speech on Asia's democracy in Taipei on Sunday evening. His visit to Taiwan will be his first he left the White House in January 2001.
Clinton ordered two aircraft carrier battle groups to waters near Taiwan after China lobbed ballistic missiles into shipping lanes near Taiwan's main island in 1996.
The German city of Hamburg on Oct. 14 named a bridge “Kaohsiung-Brucke” after the Taiwanese city of Kaohsiung. The footbridge, formerly known as F566, is to the east of the Speicherstadt, the world’s largest warehouse district, and connects the Dar-es-Salaam-Platz to the Brooktorpromenade near the Port of Hamburg on the Elbe River. Timo Fischer, a Free Democratic Party member of the Hamburg-Mitte District Assembly, in May last year proposed the name change with support from members of the Social Democratic Party and the Christian Democratic Union. Kaohsiung and Hamburg in 1999 inked a sister city agreement, but despite more than a quarter-century of
Taiwanese officials are courting podcasters and influencers aligned with US President Donald Trump as they grow more worried the US leader could undermine Taiwanese interests in talks with China, people familiar with the matter said. Trump has said Taiwan would likely be on the agenda when he is expected to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) next week in a bid to resolve persistent trade tensions. China has asked the White House to officially declare it “opposes” Taiwanese independence, Bloomberg reported last month, a concession that would mark a major diplomatic win for Beijing. President William Lai (賴清德) and his top officials
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday expressed “grave concerns” after Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財) reiterated the city-state’s opposition to “Taiwanese independence” during a meeting with Chinese Premier Li Qiang (李強). In Singapore on Saturday, Wong and Li discussed cross-strait developments, the Singaporean Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. “Prime Minister Wong reiterated that Singapore has a clear and consistent ‘one China’ policy and is opposed to Taiwan independence,” it said. MOFA responded that it is an objective fact and a common understanding shared by many that the Republic of China (ROC) is an independent, sovereign nation, with world-leading
‘ONE CHINA’: A statement that Berlin decides its own China policy did not seem to sit well with Beijing, which offered only one meeting with the German official German Minister for Foreign Affairs Johann Wadephul’s trip to China has been canceled, a spokesperson for his ministry said yesterday, amid rising tensions between the two nations, including over Taiwan. Wadephul had planned to address Chinese curbs on rare earths during his visit, but his comments about Berlin deciding on the “design” of its “one China” policy ahead of the trip appear to have rankled China. Asked about Wadephul’s comments, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Guo Jiakun (郭嘉昆) said the “one China principle” has “no room for any self-definition.” In the interview published on Thursday, Wadephul said he would urge China to
RSS