People should stand more united than ever and strive to expand the nation’s international space in the face of Beijing’s attempts to harm Taiwan’s diplomatic efforts, Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) said yesterday.
Su made the remarks before a meeting at the Legislative Yuan in response to media queries about whether Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) should be held responsible for the Solomon Islands’ decision to sever ties.
The nation’s diplomatic situation has always been difficult due to Chinese oppression, and diplomatic personnel are faced with very precarious situations, Su said.
Photo: CNA
“China enticed the Solomon Islands with money and bought off its politicians, which caused our diplomacy to suffer a setback, but all citizens should stand more united than ever before to defend Taiwan’s international space and forge international friendships,” the premier said.
Under Wu’s leadership, Taiwan-US ties have reached new highs, with the US in July providing President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) the highest-level reception ever for a sitting president and approving the sale of the most advanced weapons to date, he said.
The nation has also earned respect for its efforts to engage in agriculture, sanitation and culture exchanges with the international community, he said, calling on people to support diplomats.
Asked the same question by reporters, Vice Premier Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) said that Taipei has forged closer unofficial ties with Washington and Tokyo, while the international community has witnessed its sincerity in sharing its agricultural and medical knowledge.
Taiwan should not march to the beat of China’s drum and deny its own accomplishments, he added.
Presidential Office spokesman Alex Huang (黃重諺) on Monday night lashed out at China on Facebook, saying that China gave its neighbor trouble because it “could not handle Hong Kong or deal with the US.”
China’s poaching of the Solomon Islands is comparable to “a frustrated, good-for-nothing jerk who beats his wife and children and attacks his neighbor,” he said.
The post was no longer available for public viewing yesterday.
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:
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