President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) will head the country’s delegation to the Taiwan-Pacific Allies Summit in the Solomon Islands on Oct. 20, Solomons ambassador Beraki Jino said yesterday.
It would be Ma’s first substantive trip overseas to meet diplomatic allies.
Ma had declared a diplomatic truce with China as part of efforts to prevent Beijing from seeking to woo more of Taiwan’s allies. Last year’s summit was canceled as Ma courted China.
“I think the summit will be very low key,” said Shane Lee (李憲榮), a political science professor at Chang Jung Christian University in Tainan.
“Ma is trying to show goodwill to China, so [he] doesn’t want to emphasize the sovereignty of Taiwan,” Lee said.
South Pacific allies, some of which are struggling with substandard health care systems and the threat of being swallowed by rising seas because of global warming, will ask Taiwan to make its positions clear and break new ground in the region, Jino said.
“Mostly we are looking to the Ma administration, to what it can do to strengthen and broaden areas of cooperation instead of just expecting Taiwan to give aid to us,” he said.
In related news, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday it would release a white paper next month on foreign aid, outlining the government’s approach to “professional and effective” overseas assistance.”
“Now that statistics concerning our foreign aid programs have been compiled according to the standards of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD], the white paper is scheduled to be released in early May,” Department of Economic and Trade Affairs Director-General Weber Shih (施文斌) said.
“The main goal of issuing a white paper on foreign aid is to bring Taiwan’s overseas aid program in line with international trends,” Shih said of the initiative, which will be the first white paper on foreign aid.
The ministry first broached the idea of a white paper last September, but the project was delayed by efforts to bring methodology in line with international standards.
Shih said the paper would stress “transparency and professionalism” as guidelines for overseas assistance.
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