President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) on Sunday said in Swaziland, the final stop of his 12-day trip to Africa, that his three-nation visit had helped him gain a deeper understanding of the country’s diplomatic allies.
“It’s been a worthwhile trip,” Ma said, adding that Taiwan had forged strong friendships with its diplomatic allies during the trip.
Ma also talked about his administration’s promotion of “flexible diplomacy” since he took office in 2008, saying that a diplomatic truce with China has won international recognition.
Photo: CNA
On the economic front, Taiwan should “conditionally provide assistance” to its diplomatic allies in Africa because their economies are still developing and need foreign aid, Ma said.
“We should try to make others feel we are an international asset rather than a liability” by contributing to international assistance programs in accordance with the norms set by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development,” Ma said.
Taiwan has donated 300 notebook computers worth US$300,000 to the southeast African kingdom, Ambassador to Swaziland Peter Tsai (蔡明耀) announced on Sunday.
It has also donated 1.6 million euros (US$2.1 million) to Burkina Faso to help it address problems caused by the influx of 40,000 refugees from Mali and US$3 million to The Gambia to help deal with a food crisis.
After taking part in a -penalty-kick soccer shootout in The Gambia with Gambian President Yahya Jammeh on Saturday, Ma had another sports challenge with Swazi King Mswati III, Africa’s sole remaining absolute monarch, after arriving there on Sunday, in which Ma and the king both did 20 pushups and 20 sit-ups.
The president’s visit was meant to solidify diplomatic ties, deepen understanding and review joint projects in medicine, agriculture, vocational education and infrastructure, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
Ma is scheduled to return to Taiwan tomorrow.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching