A newly launched think tank is to be tasked with implementing the government’s New Southbound Policy and strengthening engagement with the nation’s Asian neighbors, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday.
The Taiwan-Asia Exchange Foundation (TAEF) is to be used to advance the New Southbound Policy ties as well as with the rest of Asia, said Tsai, speaking at the launch ceremony.
“TAEF will work on the frontline, implementing our New Southbound Policy and strengthening Taiwan’s overall engagement with Asian society,” Tsai said. “That engagement includes cultivating relationships with civil society, young people and think tanks in other countries.”
“The strategy aims to be people-centric, highlight regional inclusiveness and devote itself to deepening multilateral partnerships,” she added.
Since Taiwan launched the policy to enhance exchanges with ASEAN members as well as India, Australia and New Zealand two years ago, the nation has witnessed a gradual reshaping of its Asia strategy, Tsai said.
Another major task for the government-funded think tank would be to organize the annual Yushan Forum, which was launched in October last year to promote Taiwan’s regional status and to support the government’s efforts to forge a broader relationship with countries targeted by the New Southbound Policy, Tsai said, adding that the forum is a resource-sharing program and platform that allows Taiwan and other countries to collaborate and embrace the future together.
More than 800 leading thinkers from home and abroad attended last year’s forum, with more expected to attend this year’s event on Oct. 11 to 12, she said.
TAEF is chaired by Senior Advisor Presidential Hsiao Hsin-huang (蕭新煌), while its executive director is Yang Hao (楊昊), who is also director of the Southeast Asian Studies Center at National Chengchi University.
The ceremony was attended by representatives from Singapore, Vietnam, Australia, Japan and the US.
Meanwhile, the top Vietnamese representative to Taiwan, Tran Duy Hai, told local media on the sideline of the ceremony that he would be leaving his post on Thursday next week.
Before his departure, Tran said he hopes to say goodbye to Tsai and present the president with a Vietnamese vase decorated with a lotus motif as a parting gift.
The lotus is the national flower of Vietnam and symbolizes peace and stability, Tran added.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods