Foreign Affairs: Two offices in Africa to close

The government plans to close two of its representative offices in Africa, Lee Cheng-hsiung (李辰雄), director of the Department of African Affairs under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), said yesterday. The factors that the MOFA will take into consideration when choosing which missions to close will be unsatisfactory exchanges, the host country not working well with Taiwan, the inability to provide tax exemptions, scant trade and investment exchanges, and the small number of overseas Chinese in the country where the offices are located. Lee said that Taiwan has embassies in each of the eight African countries with which Taiwan has diplomatic relations: Liberia, Chad, Gambia, Burkina Faso, Senegal, Sao Tome and Principe, Malawi and Swaziland.