The Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) Washington office has attacked claims made last week by a delegation from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was facing rising domestic resistance to the expansion of a US long-range radar system
“There has been no such domestic pressure,” the DPP office said in a statement on Monday.
A Washington Times article on Friday last week said that a member of the delegation told the paper that “President Ma has been enduring so much domestic pressure. He questions: ‘Why do you need these long-range radar towers, which can detect the long-range missiles of China that won’t target Taiwan, but target other countries?’”
The paper added that the official, which it identified as Department of Policy Planning Director-General Dale Jieh (介文汲), had also said that many people in Taiwan wondered why such big radar towers were needed.
On Monday, the ministry said the remarks had been misattributed and had actually been made by Association of Foreign Relations secretary-general Huang Kwei-bo (黃奎博), an associate professor in National Chengchi University’s Department of Diplomacy.
The Washington Times article had taken some members of the US Congress by surprise because, according to officials contacted by the Taipei Times, it was the first they had heard of domestic resistance to the radar system.
“As the largest opposition party in Taiwan, the DPP has been fully supportive of the early warning radar project since its inception, and has also consistently advocated greater defense coordination with the United States,” the DPP statement said.
It said the DPP had called on Ma to increase the investment of resources in national security, which has been in steady decline over the past six years even though Taiwan remained the primary target of China and the expansion of its People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA).
“As Taiwan seeks to forge a positive relationship with the People’s Republic of China, it must nevertheless maintain a robust self-defense capability to ensure peace and deter invasion, as well as to assist in the defense of friends and supporters in whatever way possible,” the DPP statement said.
“It is therefore disappointing to see diplomatic officials deflecting responsibility abroad for the Ma administration’s weak record on defense with vague assertions about domestic opposition — and even more so when such assertions do not accord with widespread public perceptions in Taiwan,” the party said.
At a time when Taiwan’s friends in the US Congress and defense community are seeking to integrate Taiwan into the regional security architecture, the nation should unequivocally signal its willingness to shoulder the responsibility for its own defense and to serve as a net contributor to the maintenance of peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region, the party said.
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