Sun, Apr 09, 2006 page3

• US friends seek to end ban on officials

  TAIWAN CAUCUS Steve Chabot and Sherrod Brown teamed up with a lobby group to push legislation designed to lift travel limitations on top-ranking Taiwanese officials

  • By Charles Snyder / STAFF REPORTER IN WASHINGTON
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  With the upcoming Washington visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) in mind, two co-chairmen of the Congressional Taiwan Caucus have introduced legislation in the House of Representatives that would lift all limits on trips to Washington by President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and other top Taiwanese leaders.

  The bill, sponsored by Steve Chabot and Sherrod Brown, two Ohio members, was introduced on Thursday and referred to the House International Relations Committee for deliberation.

  Noting that Taiwan is one of the "flashpoints in the world," the bill says that direct meetings between top US and Taiwanese leaders are in the US national interest.

  It says the current policy, which bars Taiwan's president, vice president, premier, foreign minister and defense minister from coming to Washington, dates from the 1970s and was instituted under pressure from China.

  In 1994, Congress passed a law that challenged that policy by allowing Taiwan's president and other high-level officials into the US for talks with officials on a range of issues, including matters of national security, trade and prevention of nuclear proliferation. The Chabot-Brown bill takes note of that law.

  "Taiwan is one of the strongest democratic allies of the US in the Asia-Pacific region," the bill states. Yet, while US President George W. Bush in a speech in Kyoto last November praised Taiwan's democracy, that "has yet to be translated into equal treatment of Taiwan's democratically elected leaders ... while allowing the unelected leaders of the People's Republic of China to routinely visit Washington, and welcoming them to the White House."

  The bill would end "all restrictions" on visits by Taiwan's president and other top officials, encourage high-level contacts at Cabinet level to "strengthen a policy dialogue with Taiwan's government," and declare it to be "in the national interest of the US to strengthen its links with the democratically elected government of Taiwan and demonstrate stronger support for democracy in the Asia-Pacific region."

  The bill, which expresses the "sense of Congress," would not be binding on the administration.

  International Relations Committee chairman Henry Hyde this week praised Taiwan as "a great example to the rest of the world about how democracy can work."

  "I think the [Taiwanese] people are extraordinarily brave, extraordinarily productive. They have fought Communism successfully by themselves for many years, and they defeated Communism, and are still a free and sovereign state," he said after receiving the highest civilian award from Chen.

  "Their interests are our interests, and our interests are their interests," he added.

  The Formosan Association for Public Affairs, which had a role in drafting the bill, praised it strongly.

  "The timing of the introduction of this important resolution is very significant," association president C.T. Lee said.

  "With the upcoming visit of China's unelected President Hu Jintao to the White House, the [caucus] co-chairs are sending a crystal clear signal to President Bush that the democratically elected president of Taiwan should be welcomed to DC as well," he said.

  Hu will visit Washington from April 19 to April 21. He will spend much of the day of the 20th with Bush and his aides, with an all-morning meeting and a formal lunch.

  The visit will be a working visit, not a state visit, so Hu will not be given the normal formal dinner at the White House.

  His big public appearance will be at a dinner on the 20th, when a passel of private organizations seeking good relations with Beijing hosts him at a dinner in which he will give a speech.

  During his two days in Washington, Hu will also meet with members of Congress, China supporters at the Chinese Embassy, and various China-watchers in the city.

  After a trip to Yale University, Hu will then visit Nicaragua, Morocco and Saudi Arabia.
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