Taiwan and China yesterday signed two agreements on investment protection and customs cooperation, with officials stressing that the pacts would provide a system for protecting cross-strait investors and create a better investment environment.
Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) Chairman Chiang Pin-kung (江丙坤) and Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林) signed the two agreements after a five-hour meeting at the Grand Hotel in Taipei.
The investment protection pact would set up a mechanism to solve G2G (government-to-government), P2P (private-to-private) and P2G (private-to-government) disputes, and help protect the rights of Taiwanese businesspeople in China, while the customs cooperation agreement would facilitate customs reporting and information sharing.
Photo: Sam Yeh, AFP
The signing of the investment pact will offer cross-strait investors stronger institutionalized protection for their property rights, management rights and personal safety, Chiang said.
Under the agreement, investors will be able to choose arbitration institutions in Taiwan or China to deal with their disputes. The protection extends to Taiwanese investments in China made via a third country or area, but investors would not be allowed to pick an arbitration institution in the third area.
An SEF official said that the Beijing government still needs to work out related legislation for P2G commercial disputes, but added that it had seen China’s “sincerity” in enacting the agreement as soon as possible.
ARATS Vice Chairman Zheng Lizhong (鄭立中) said the pact would provide strong protection to Taiwanese investors in China, while increasing cross-strait bilateral investments.
As for the customs pact, companies from both sides should enjoy lower costs after customs valuations and tariff classifications are standardized, officials said.
During the eighth round of cross-strait talks yesterday, officials also agreed that other Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) issues relating to commodity trade, service trade and a dispute-resolving mechanism would be discussed at the next round of talks.
Speaking at the opening ceremony, Chiang acknowledged that the implementation of 16 previous agreements — including the rights of Taiwanese civilians or businesspeople detained in China, opening Taiwan to Chinese individual tourists, deportation of economic criminals and food safety — had failed to meet public expectations.
“People across the Taiwan Strait are highly supportive of systematic cross-strait negotiations, but the implementation of some agreements failed to meet expectations ... The two sides should join forces and examine the implementation of agreements on a regular basis to avoid mishandling of individual cases from damaging mutual trust,” he said.
To address concerns over the personal safety of Taiwanese businesspeople detained or deprived of their personal freedom in China, the investment protection pact states that Chinese authorities should inform the detainees’ family members or companies within 24 hours, and allow family members and lawyers to visit them. Taiwan is to follow the same procedures when dealing with Chinese businesspeople detained in Taiwan.
The issue has drawn wide attention in Taiwan after Bruce Chung (鍾鼎邦), a Taiwanese Falun Gong practitioner, was detained in China on June 18 for what Chinese authorities described as “jeopardizing China’s national security.”
Chung’s detention has raised concern about China’s poor human rights record. Pro-independence advocates and civic groups have questioned China’s willingness to implement the investment protection agreement and protect Taiwanese investors’ personal safety.
Chen yesterday promised that the two agreements would help foster a better environment for investors across the Taiwan Strait and said follow-up negotiations on the ECFA would be the priority in future talks.
The SEF and ARATS will also discuss new issues in future cross-strait negotiations, such as technology, culture and education, which have increasingly drawn public attention as cross-strait exchanges increased, he said.
After signing the agreements, Chiang and Chen exchanged gifts. The SEF presented a lacquer painting featuring grapes to symbolize a fruitful cross-strait development, while ARATS gave the SEF a pair of vases.
The two envoys did not comment on speculation that both would retire from their posts and that this would be the last time they would be participating in cross-strait talks.
“It is thanks to the team’s hard work that we have achieved the signing of these follow-up agreements after the cross-strait ECFA,” Chiang told a press conference after the signing ceremony.
Later yesterday, the SEF confirmed that service trade would be the priority issue in the next Chiang-Chen meeting.
Investment Commission Executive Secretary-General Fan Liang-tung (范良棟), who was at the meeting, said that compared with service trade, commodity trade would be more difficult to handle as it involves the issue of zero tariffs.
However, the SEF remained confident that the issue of commodity trade may finally be solved following its success in signing the ECFA.
The SEF added that it expected to establish long-term bilateral contacts with ARATS to review the execution of agreements signed to promote the welfare of people from both sides of the Strait.
PREPAREDNESS: Given the difficulty of importing ammunition during wartime, the Ministry of National Defense said it would prioritize ‘coproduction’ partnerships A newly formed unit of the Marine Corps tasked with land-based security operations has recently replaced its aging, domestically produced rifles with more advanced, US-made M4A1 rifles, a source said yesterday. The unnamed source familiar with the matter said the First Security Battalion of the Marine Corps’ Air Defense and Base Guard Group has replaced its older T65K2 rifles, which have been in service since the late 1980s, with the newly received M4A1s. The source did not say exactly when the upgrade took place or how many M4A1s were issued to the battalion. The confirmation came after Chinese-language media reported
The Taiwanese passport ranked 33rd in a global listing of passports by convenience this month, rising three places from last month’s ranking, but matching its position in January last year. The Henley Passport Index, an international ranking of passports by the number of designations its holder can travel to without a visa, showed that the Taiwan passport enables holders to travel to 139 countries and territories without a visa. Singapore’s passport was ranked the most powerful with visa-free access to 192 destinations out of 227, according to the index published on Tuesday by UK-based migration investment consultancy firm Henley and Partners. Japan’s and
A Ministry of Foreign Affairs official yesterday said that a delegation that visited China for an APEC meeting did not receive any kind of treatment that downgraded Taiwan’s sovereignty. Department of International Organizations Director-General Jonathan Sun (孫儉元) said that he and a group of ministry officials visited Shenzhen, China, to attend the APEC Informal Senior Officials’ Meeting last month. The trip went “smoothly and safely” for all Taiwanese delegates, as the Chinese side arranged the trip in accordance with long-standing practices, Sun said at the ministry’s weekly briefing. The Taiwanese group did not encounter any political suppression, he said. Sun made the remarks when
BROAD AGREEMENT: The two are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff to 15% and a commitment for TSMC to build five more fabs, a ‘New York Times’ report said Taiwan and the US have reached a broad consensus on a trade deal, the Executive Yuan’s Office of Trade Negotiations said yesterday, after a report said that Washington is set to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent. The New York Times on Monday reported that the two nations are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent and commit Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to building at least five more facilities in the US. “The agreement, which has been under negotiation for months, is being legally scrubbed and could be announced this month,” the paper said,
RSS