American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Chairman Raymond Burghardt will arrive in Taipei tomorrow for a four-day visit, during which he will meet with President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), AIT said yesterday in a press release.
AIT declined to specify the purpose of Burghardt’s trip, but according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he will brief Taiwanese -officials on the latest developments regarding Chinese President Hu Jintao’s (胡錦濤) state visit to the US.
US President Barack Obama reaffirmed on Thursday, in a joint press conference with Hu and later in a US-China joint statement, that the US is committed to “a ‘one China’ policy based on the three US-China communiques and the Taiwan Relations Act.”
According to Taiwan’s top -representative in the US, Jason Yuan (袁健生), Washington briefed Taiwan on the visit prior to Hu’s arrival and agreed that in the future it would provide briefings both before and immediately after important US-China meetings.
Burghardt’s visit to Taiwan, which will last until Wednesday, will be the 10th he has made since being appointed AIT chairman in February 2006, the AIT statement said.
Burghardt, who was the director of AIT’s Taipei office from 1999 to 2001, will meet with several major political and business leaders during his stay, AIT said. He is currently the director of East-West Seminars at the East-West Center in Honalulu, Hawaii, a position he holds concurrently with his AIT chairmanship.
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