The Pennsylvania General Assembly has adopted two resolutions to enhance friendship between the US state and Taiwan.
The Pennsylvania Senate and House of Representatives unanimously passed two identical resolutions on Wednesday last week and Tuesday respectively to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the enactment of the US’ Taiwan Relations Act (TRA) and improve the state’s relations with Taiwan.
The resolutions, sponsored by Pennsylvania Senator Gene Yaw and State Representative Marcy Toepel, say that Taiwan is Pennsylvania’s seventh-largest export market in Asia, while the state is home to a growing number of Taiwanese companies.
An agreement regarding driver’s license reciprocity was signed in 2015, the same year that Life Sciences Pennsylvania, the state’s trade association for its life sciences community, signed a memorandum of understanding with the Taiwan Bio Industry Organization, which promotes the nation’s biotechnology, the resolutions said.
The memorandum fosters “new business opportunities, partnerships and research collaboration” between the two sides, the two resolutions said.
The US and the Republic of China uphold the same values of freedom and democracy and are bonded by their shared commitment to human rights, the rule of law and a free market economy, the resolutions state.
The Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in New York City on Wednesday thanked the Pennsylvania General Assembly for the passage of the two resolutions.
The TRA was signed into law on April 10, 1979, by then-US president Jimmy Carter following the US switching diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing the previous year.
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