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Absent allies will not affect summit, says MOFA

Although a number of Taiwan's Central American allies will be absent from an annual conference held between Taiwan and Central America, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday the attendance would not affect diplomatic relations since those allies would send proxies to the meeting.

The 13th reunion of the Mixed Commission Conference of Central American Nations with Taiwan will be held today in Belize and Foreign Minister James Huang (黃志芳) has flown to Belize to attend the conference.

But out of eight of the country's allies in Central America, only the foreign minister of Belize, Eamon Courtenay, and his Dominican counterpart Carlos Morales Troncoso will participate.

Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador will only send deputies to the meeting.

Some political observers have speculated that it is a warning sign that these nations might sever diplomatic relations with Taiwan in the wake of the World Health Assembly (WHA) vote.

Seven of Taiwan's 24 allies did not give their support to Taiwan's motion at the WHA. Panama, Nicaragua, the Marshall Islands and St. Lucia were all absent from the vote while Haiti waived its voting rights.

The Dominican Republic forfeited its voting rights by not paying its membership fee. Costa Rica voted against Taiwan.

MOFA spokesman David Wang (王建業) said the ministry had not ignored the recent diplomatic setback and was taking the matter seriously.

The ministry has conducted an investigation and the allies had explained their actions, he said.

"In our understanding, most of [the absent allies] are heading for Europe and have meetings in the EU," Wang said,adding that the WHA voting incident was past and Taiwan believed that the absence of the foreign ministers from the meeting was not intentional.

Later in the day, the ministry issued a statement, saying that Huang had met Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and Foreign Minister Samuel Santos.

Santos explained to Huang about his absence from the meeting in Belize, saying it was because he had to fulfill other commitments. But in order not to miss the opportunity to communicate with Huang, Santos canceled his visit to Guatemala and stayed in the capital Managua for two days to receive Huang, the release said.
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