Russia’s decision to put Taiwan on a list of foreign countries deemed “unfriendly” to Moscow since its invasion of Ukraine would for now have little effect on bilateral relations, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said yesterday.
Taiwan’s representative office in Moscow is operating normally and is carrying out its mission, including assisting Taiwanese evacuated from Ukraine, without Russian interference, Wu said.
However, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs would closely monitor the situation so that it is prepared to respond accordingly if Russia takes any action against Taiwan, he added.
Photo: CNA
Wu’s comments were made after the Russian government on Monday released a list of 48 countries and territories deemed unfriendly to Moscow because they had imposed or joined international sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine.
Taiwan is on the list along with Albania, Andorra, Australia Canada, Iceland, Japan, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, North Macedonia, Norway, San Marino, Singapore, South Korea, Switzerland, Ukraine, the UK and the US, as well as EU member states and Micronesia, Russian state news agency TASS reported.
TASS mentioned Taiwan as being “considered a territory of China, but ruled by its own administration since 1949,” as Moscow has diplomatic ties with Beijing.
Russia is allowing all of its public entities, its citizens and local enterprises to pay back debts to any creditors in the listed countries and territories in rubles, which has plunged to all-time lows since the sanctions were imposed, TASS reported.
Wu told a session of the Legislative Yuan yesterday that investment and trade between Taiwan and Russia are “not very significant,” so being included on the list is not expected to have a major impact on Taiwan.
Government data for last year showed that bilateral trade between Taiwan and Russia reached US$6.31 billion, with exports to Russia totaling US$1.32 billion and accounting for 0.76 percent of total outbound sales.
According to the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Taiwan mainly exports to Russia machine parts, discs, auto parts, audio and visual signal equipment, polycarbonate resin and stainless steel flat-rolled products, while mainly importing raw materials, early-stage processed products — such as coal, petroleum, aluminum and iron — and non-alloy steel semi-finished products.
In 2019, Russia became Taiwan’s ninth-largest machine tool export market, with exported machine tools totaling US$107.95 million.
Meanwhile, total trade volume with Ukraine in the first 11 months of last year totaled US$280.75 million and accounted for 0.037 percent of Taiwan’s total trade volume.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lo Chih-cheng (羅致政), who doubles as the DPP’s head of international affairs, told reporters that Taiwan did not need to worry too much about being on Russia’s list of unfriendly countries.
Taiwan is joining many countries worldwide in showing solidarity with Ukraine and has the “moral high ground,” Lo said.
Taiwan has announced that it intends to join the US and other countries in imposing sanctions against Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, but it has yet to provide further details.
The nation also launched a fundraising campaign that has so far raised more than NT$400 million (US$14.11 million) in less than a week and donated supplies to Ukraine.
PROVOCATIVE: Chinese Deputy Ambassador to the UN Sun Lei accused Japan of sending military vessels to deliberately provoke tensions in the Taiwan Strait China denounced remarks by Japan and the EU about the South China Sea at a UN Security Council meeting on Monday, and accused Tokyo of provocative behavior in the Taiwan Strait and planning military expansion. Ayano Kunimitsu, a Japanese vice foreign minister, told the Council meeting on maritime security that Tokyo was seriously concerned about the situation in the East China and South China seas, and reiterated Japan’s opposition to any attempt to change the “status quo” by force, and obstruction of freedom of navigation and overflight. Stavros Lambrinidis, head of the EU delegation to the UN, also highlighted South China Sea
The final batch of 28 M1A2T Abrams tanks purchased from the US arrived at Taipei Port last night and were transported to the Armor Training Command in Hsinchu County’s Hukou Township (湖口), completing the military’s multi-year procurement of 108 of the tanks. Starting at 12:10am today, reporters observed more than a dozen civilian flatbed trailers departing from Taipei Port, each carrying an M1A2T tank covered with black waterproof tarps. Escorted by military vehicles, the convoy traveled via the West Coast Expressway to the Armor Training Command, with police implementing traffic control. The army operates about 1,000 tanks, including CM-11 Brave Tiger
China on Wednesday teased in a video an aircraft carrier that could be its fourth, and the first using nuclear power, while making an allusion to Taiwan and vowing to further build up its islands, as it looks to boost maritime power, secure resources and bolster territorial claims. The video, issued on the eve of the 77th founding anniversary of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy, featured fictional officers with names that are homophones of three commissioned aircraft carriers, the Liaoning (遼寧), Shandong (山東) and Fujian (福建). Titled Into the Deep, it showed a 19-year-old named “Hejian” (何劍) joining the group, sparking
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, said it expects its 2-nanometer (2nm) chip capacity to grow at a compound annual rate of 70 percent from this year to 2028. The projection comes as five fabs begin volume production of 2-nanometer chips this year — two in Hsinchu and three in Kaohsiung — TSMC senior vice president and deputy cochief operating officer Cliff Hou (侯永清) said at the company’s annual technology symposium in Silicon Valley, California, last week. Output in the first year of 2-nanometer production, which began in the fourth quarter of last year, is expected to
RSS