Taiwan’s representative to the US on Thursday renewed a proposal for the US government to review its guidelines on relations with Taiwan, which set various restrictions on the unofficial interactions between Washington and Taipei.
Representative to the US Jason Yuan (袁健生) said some of the restrictions listed in the guidelines seem out of date because they have remained unchanged for decades, “although Taiwan-US relations have been progressing.”
The US State Department has routinely repeated the guidelines to all US embassies between August and September every year since the 1980s, Yuan said.
He said the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the US has on many occasions requested Washington to review the guidelines, and that he believed the two sides would eventually come to a consensus for change after mutual trust is established.
Yuan made the remarks when asked by Taiwanese media to comment on the US State Department’s move last week to again notify US embassies of the guidelines.
In a report published on Thursday, the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) cited an unidentified former US official as saying the situation indicated that the recent transition of power in Taiwan and improvement in Taiwan-China relations had not led to any change in the policy of the administration of US President George W. Bush toward Taiwan.
For any possible breakthrough to be achieved, Taiwan would have to continue to challenge the restrictions through the new US administration to be elected in November, the official told the daily.
The guidelines were adopted by the US government after Washington switched recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979.
Among other stipulations, the guidelines specify that meetings between US and Taiwanese officials may not occur in the State Department buildings, the White House or the Old Executive Office Building, and that executive branch personnel are not permitted to attend functions held at the Washington residence of Taiwan’s representative to the US.
Officials from the US Department of Defense and State Department above the rank of office director or the rank of colonel or Navy captain are also restricted under the regulations from traveling to Taiwan on “official business,” while executive branch officials at or above the level of assistant secretary of state or three-star flag military officers may not visit Taiwan for personal travel without advance clearance from the State Department. All travel must be on “tourist” rather than “official” passports.
In addition, executive branch personnel are not permitted to officially correspond by mail directly with Taiwanese officials unless their correspondence is first sent to the American Institute in Taiwan.
The guidelines also restrict executive branch personnel from referring to the people of Taiwan as “Taiwanese,” but require them instead to refer to the population as the “people on Taiwan.”
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