Former Philippine senator Manuel Roxas II will visit Taiwan as a special envoy of his country’s president to explain Manila’s rationale in handling a cross-border fraud case involving 14 Taiwanese fraud suspects the way it did, a senior Philippine official confirmed yesterday.
Manila Economic and Cultural Office Chairman Amadeo Perez Jr, who arrived in Taipei yesterday, said Roxas would visit Taiwan in a bid to reduce the tension arising from the Philippines’ deportation of the Taiwanese to China.
Perez made the remarks just before meeting Minister of Foreign Affairs Timothy Yang (楊進添).
The Feb. 2 deportations angered Taipei, which recalled its top representative to Manila in protest against what it called the Philippines’ disregard for Taiwan’s sovereignty and jurisprudence.
Taipei reacted strongly to the deportation of the Taiwanese to China, along with 10 Chinese suspects, saying that the Philippines had ignored Taiwan’s rights to jurisdiction over the Taiwanese.
The government also took punitive action against the Philippines, including tightening the process for screening applications by Filipinos seeking to work in Taiwan.
According to Perez, Manila views Taiwan as a very friendly country with which the Philippines has maintained good relations for many year, which he hoped would continue.
The meeting between Perez and Yang was the first at such a high level since the dispute erupted.
Roxas, 53, is a career politician who comes from a political family. His father is former Philippine senator Gerry Roxas and he is the grandson of former Philippine president Manuel Roxas and industrialist J. Amado Araneta.
Yang, who previously said that Taipei’s response would be “contingent on who the envoy is and what message he or she brings,” said yesterday he was glad Philippine President Benigno Aquino III decided to send a trusted friend.
However, whether Roxas will meet President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) depends on what message he brings and would not be decided until after he meets with Yang, the minister said.
Yang added that Manila’s mention of its “one China” policy and a mutual legal assistance agreement between Taiwan and China as explanations for its handling of the incident were “simply unacceptable.”
“By mentioning those things — the ‘one China’ policy and cross-strait affairs, the Philippines has unnecessarily touched upon a delicate area that should not be involved,” Yang said.
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