Swedish lawmakers have proposed a motion to have a building in Taiwan similar to the House of Sweden in Washington, with the motion expected to be debated and voted on soon, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday.
The idea was first mentioned on April 14 during a five-day visit to Taiwan by a Swedish delegation.
The House of Sweden building in Washington is evocative of the climate of Sweden and its political transparency. In addition to being the Swedish embassy, the building also houses the embassies of Iceland and Liechtenstein, as well as Swedish companies.
Photo: EPA-EFE / Ministry of Foreign Affairs
The delegation said it would propose changing the name of Sweden’s representative office in Taipei, the Swedish Trade and Invest Council, to the House of Sweden to symbolize an expanded range of diplomatic work in Taiwan, Department of European Affairs Director Remus Chen (陳立國) said yesterday.
Swedish Parliament Deputy Speaker Kerstin Lundgren on April 14 told reporters in Taipei that she had been one of the lawmakers who initiated the motion, adding that it has received the support of a majority of lawmakers on the Riksdag’s Foreign Affairs Committee.
While the Swedish government has the final say, the Swedish parliament hopes to express its support for Taiwan through this gesture, Lundgren said.
“As a sovereign nation, it is up to Sweden how the ‘one China’ policy is interpreted. From our point of view, the name change does not violate the ‘one China’ policy,” she said.
By changing the name to the House of Sweden, we hope to underscore that Taiwan should be seen as a sovereign nation and not a province of China, Swedish lawmaker Markus Wiechel said at the time.
Meanwhile, the ministry declined to comment on whether Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa’s defeat in elections on Sunday would impact a reported plan to open reciprocal representative offices.
Asked if the ouster of Jansa could jeopardize the reported talks, Chen did not directly answer the question, saying only that Taiwan had congratulated Slovenia on holding a “peaceful election through a democratic process.”
“The government is ready to deepen its cooperation with the new Slovenian government on various fronts and across party lines to pursue mutually beneficial relationships,” he said, without elaborating.
In Sunday’s elections, the ruling Slovenian Democratic Party, led by Jansa, was defeated by Robert Golob and his Freedom Movement party.
Jansa has visited Taiwan on four occasions and he founded the Slovenia-Taiwan Parliamentarian Friendship Association.
During an interview with Indian broadcaster Doordarshan in January, Jansa said that Slovenia and Taiwan were working on exchanging representatives and opening representative offices.
CHIPMAKING INVESTMENT: J.W. Kuo told legislators that Department of Investment Review approval would be needed were Washington to seek a TSMC board seat Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) yesterday said he received information about a possible US government investment in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and an assessment of the possible effect on the firm requires further discussion. If the US were to invest in TSMC, the plan would need to be reviewed by the Department of Investment Review, Kuo told reporters ahead of a hearing of the legislature’s Economics Committee. Kuo’s remarks came after US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Tuesday said that the US government is looking into the federal government taking equity stakes in computer chip manufacturers that
POWER PLANT POLL: The TPP said the number of ‘yes’ votes showed that the energy policy should be corrected, and the KMT said the result was a win for the people’s voice The government does not rule out advanced nuclear energy generation if it meets the government’s three prerequisites, President William Lai (賴清德) said last night after the number of votes in favor of restarting a nuclear power plant outnumbered the “no” votes in a referendum yesterday. The referendum failed to pass, despite getting more “yes” votes, as the Referendum Act (公民投票法) states that the vote would only pass if the votes in favor account for more than one-fourth of the total number of eligible voters and outnumber the opposing votes. Yesterday’s referendum question was: “Do you agree that the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers have declared they survived recall votes to remove them from office today, although official results are still pending as the vote counting continues. Although final tallies from the Central Election Commission (CEC) are still pending, preliminary results indicate that the recall campaigns against all seven KMT lawmakers have fallen short. As of 6:10 pm, Taichung Legislators Yen Kuan-heng (顏寬恒) and Yang Chiung-ying (楊瓊瓔), Hsinchu County Legislator Lin Szu-ming (林思銘), Nantou County Legislator Ma Wen-chun (馬文君) and New Taipei City Legislator Lo Ming-tsai (羅明才) had all announced they
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) yesterday visited Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), as the chipmaker prepares for volume production of Nvidia’s next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) chips. It was Huang’s third trip to Taiwan this year, indicating that Nvidia’s supply chain is deeply connected to Taiwan. Its partners also include packager Siliconware Precision Industries Co (矽品精密) and server makers Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) and Quanta Computer Inc (廣達). “My main purpose is to visit TSMC,” Huang said yesterday. “As you know, we have next-generation architecture called Rubin. Rubin is very advanced. We have now taped out six brand new
RSS