Sixty-two European lawmakers from 20 countries on Friday sent a joint open letter to Lithuanian officials, backing the Baltic nation’s plan to deepen its ties with Taiwan.
“We write to express our solidarity and our support for Lithuania against the threats, intimidation and bullying behavior targeted at the Lithuanian people by the government of the People’s Republic of China,” they wrote.
“The Chinese government’s aggressive actions towards Lithuania are symptomatic of its broader refusal to abide by norms, values and standards of the international rules-based order,” the lawmakers added.
Photo: Reuters
The letter was initiated by EU lawmakers Petras Austrevicius of Lithuania and Reinhard Butikofer of Germany, who chairs the European Parliament’s delegation for relations with China, and was endorsed by lawmakers from 20 countries and five political groups, Butikofer said in a statement.
It was addressed to Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda, Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Simonyte and Viktorija Cmilyte-Nielsen, the speaker of the Seimas, the Lithuanian parliament. Copies were also sent to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and other senior EU officials.
The letter said that Beijing has put the Baltic country under pressure by recalling its ambassador and reportedly halting the issuance of export permits to some Lithuanian businesses, after the country announced that it would host a representative office bearing the name “Taiwan” in Vilnius.
Lithuania has also announced its decision to open a representative office in Taiwan in the fall.
The letter also mentioned Beijing’s de facto trade sanctions on Australia, Japan and Sweden, and its pressure campaign against the Czech Republic earlier this year, saying that China aims to coerce other countries into “geopolitical acquiescence.”
The letter called on the EU to “take a firm stance against the Chinese government’s coercive diplomacy” and reiterated the right of its member states to “conduct their economic, cultural and diplomatic relations with Taiwan as they see fit.”
In Taipei, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday welcomed the open letter, thanking the bloc’s legislature for showing support to Taiwan after its foreign affairs committee on Wednesday passed the EU-Taiwan Political Relations and Cooperation report and related proposals.
China’s bullying of one EU member state has prompted European lawmakers to go beyond their political differences to express solidarity, the ministry said.
During a discussion on the EU’s relations with China at an informal meeting of EU foreign ministers on Friday, Lithuanian Minister of Foreign Affairs Gabrielius Landsbergis said that the EU must adhere to its values and reduce dependence on trade with China.
The EU must also coordinate its China policy with like-minded countries in the Indo-Pacific region and beyond, as well as reinforce EU-NATO cooperation on China issues, Landsbergis said in a statement on the ministry’s Web site.
EUROPEAN TARGETS: The planned Munich center would support TSMC’s European customers to design high-performance, energy-efficient chips, an executive said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said that it plans to launch a new research-and-development (R&D) center in Munich, Germany, next quarter to assist customers with chip design. TSMC Europe president Paul de Bot made the announcement during a technology symposium in Amsterdam on Tuesday, the chipmaker said. The new Munich center would be the firm’s first chip designing center in Europe, it said. The chipmaker has set up a major R&D center at its base of operations in Hsinchu and plans to create a new one in the US to provide services for major US customers,
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday said that it would redesign the written portion of the driver’s license exam to make it more rigorous. “We hope that the exam can assess drivers’ understanding of traffic rules, particularly those who take the driver’s license test for the first time. In the past, drivers only needed to cram a book of test questions to pass the written exam,” Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) told a news conference at the Taoyuan Motor Vehicle Office. “In the future, they would not be able to pass the test unless they study traffic regulations
GAINING STEAM: The scheme initially failed to gather much attention, with only 188 cards issued in its first year, but gained popularity amid the COVID-19 pandemic Applications for the Employment Gold Card have increased in the past few years, with the card having been issued to a total of 13,191 people from 101 countries since its introduction in 2018, the National Development Council (NDC) said yesterday. Those who have received the card have included celebrities, such as former NBA star Dwight Howard and Australian-South Korean cheerleader Dahye Lee, the NDC said. The four-in-one Employment Gold Card combines a work permit, resident visa, Alien Resident Certificate (ARC) and re-entry permit. It was first introduced in February 2018 through the Act Governing Recruitment and Employment of Foreign Professionals (外國專業人才延攬及雇用法),
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying