President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) held closed-door meetings and spoke with US officials, including having a teleconference with US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, during her layover in New York, National Security Council Deputy Secretary-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said.
Tsai Ming-yen made the remarks on the president’s chartered flight as the delegation left the US for Haiti on Saturday.
Tsai Ing-wen met American Institute in Taiwan Chairman James Moriarty soon after her arrival in the city on Thursday afternoon, and the following day met former US secretary of state Richard Armitage, before speaking with Pelosi on the telephone, he said.
Photo: CNA
The president expressed gratitude for the US’ and Pelosi’s support of Taiwan, including the US House of Representatives’ passage of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 on Friday, which includes a section supporting continued US arms sales to Taiwan, Tsai Ming-yen said.
Before attending a banquet with the Taiwanese-American community on Friday evening, the president spoke with a number of US senators and representatives, Tsai Ming-yen said.
US congressional members were interested in the Taiwan-US relationship and voiced support for Tsai Ing-wen’s role in pragmatically growing bilateral ties, he said, adding the relationship between Taiwanese and US officials is good and trust between the two runs high.
On Saturday, the president took a tourist ferry on the Hudson River past the Statue of Liberty.
“Seeing her at a close distance helped me better appreciate the significance of the existence of freedom and democracy,” Tsai Ing-wen wrote on Facebook.
The statue represents the freedom of the US, and illuminates the path in front of democratic countries, she wrote.
Before departing the Big Apple for the Caribbean to visit four diplomatic allies at about noon on Saturday, Tsai Ing-wen walked in Central Park with young Taiwanese who mostly settled in New York after finishing their studies in the US.
During her visit to New York, Tsai also met with the UN representatives of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies at Taiwan’s liaison office in New York and delivered a speech at Columbia University.
However, Chinese groups protested her visit outside the hotel she was staying at, and were involved in physical altercations with pro-Taiwan groups.
PALAU LAUNCHES: The source said that Taiwanese military personnel traveled to Palau, where a US brigade watched their work amid plans for a defense network The military last month participated in live-fire launches of MM-104F Patriot (PAC-3) missiles under US observation in an undisclosed location in Palau, a step forward in a US-led plan to create a joint defense missile system in the first island chain, a source said on condition of anonymity. The PAC-3 is the mainstay surface-to-air missile of the US, NATO and democratic nations in East Asia, the source said, adding that it has never been live-tested within Taiwan’s borders, the source said. The proximity of Taiwan to China and China’s close surveillance of the nation’s borders and nearby sea zones is a significant
IN MOURNING: Tsai visited the site and spoke with family members of those killed, while all the major presidential candidates said they would temporarily halt campaigning A fire and subsequent explosions at a golf ball factory at Pingtung Technology Industrial Park (屏東科技產業園區) killed at least seven people, including four firefighters, and injured 98, while three were still missing, authorities said yesterday. The blaze at Launch Technologies Co’s (明揚國際) plant on Jingjian Road raged for more than 12 hours after it started at about 5pm on Friday, officials said. The Pingtung County Fire Bureau early yesterday used large excavators to search for missing people, while family members waited at the scene. Pingtung County Fire Bureau Director Hsu Mei-hsueh (許美雪) said the bureau received a call about the fire at 5:31pm
DETERRENCE: The president on Thursday is to launch the first indigenous submarine, which is to enter sea trials next month before being delivered to the navy next year Taiwan hopes to deploy at least two new, domestically developed submarines by 2027, and possibly equip later models with missiles to bolster its deterrence against the Chinese navy and protect key supply lines, the head of the program said. Taiwan has made the Indigenous Submarine Program a key part of an ambitious project to modernize its armed forces as Beijing stages almost daily military exercises. President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), who initiated the program when she took office in 2016, is expected to launch the first of eight new submarines on Thursday under a plan that has drawn on expertise and technology from
FISHING FUROR: The latest spat was sparked by a floating barrier that was found across the entrance of Scarborough Shoal during a resupply mission to fishers Beijing yesterday warned Manila not to “stir up trouble” after the Philippine Coast Guard said it removed a floating barrier at a disputed reef that was allegedly deployed by China to block Filipino fishers from the area. Scarborough Shoal (Huangyan Island, 黃岩島) in the South China Sea has long been a source of tension between the nations. China seized the ring of reefs from the Philippines in 2012 and has since deployed patrol boats. The latest spat was sparked by a 300m floating barrier that was found across the entrance of the shoal last week during a routine Philippine government resupply mission
RSS