US President Joe Biden is expected to unveil a list of nations today who would be joining a long anticipated Indo-Pacific region trade pact, but Taiwan will not be among them.
US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that Taiwan is not among the governments included in the launch of the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, a trade pact that is meant to allow the US to work more closely with key Asian economies on issues including supply chains, digital trade, clean energy and anticorruption efforts.
The US president is scheduled to highlight the launch of the framework as he meets with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida today.
Photo: AFP
“We are looking to deepen our economic partnership with Taiwan, including on high technology issues, including on semiconductor supply, but we’re pursuing that in the first instance on a bilateral basis,” Sullivan said.
The framework is meant to establish Biden’s economic strategy for the region.
Matthew Goodman, senior vice president for economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, said that some Pacific signatories are likely to be disappointed, as the pact is not expected to include provisions for greater access to the US market.
“I think a lot of partners are going to look at that list and say: ‘That’s a good list of issues. I’m happy to be involved, but, you know, are we going to get any tangible benefits out of participating in this framework?’” said Goodman, a former director for international economics on the US National Security Council during former US president Barack Obama’s administration.
Beijing has criticized the US effort to form the trade pact.
“We hope they will build an open and inclusive circle of friends in Asia-Pacific, rather than an exclusive clique, and do more for peace and development rather than creating turmoil and chaos in the region,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Wang Wenbin (汪文斌) said.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday expressed regret over Taiwan’s exclusion from the first round of IPEF members.
As an important economy, Taiwan plays a crucial role in the global supply chain and definitely qualifies for IPEF membership, it said, adding that the government would continue to seek new opportunities to join the pact.
Additional reporting by staff writer
Taiwan has arranged for about 8 million barrels of crude oil, or about one-third of its monthly needs, to be shipped from the Red Sea this month to bypass the Strait of Hormuz and ease domestic supply pressures, CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) said yesterday. The state-run oil company has worked with Middle Eastern suppliers to secure routes other than the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 percent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas typically passes, CPC chairman Fang Jeng-zen (方振仁) said at a meeting of the legislature’s Economics Committee in Taipei. Suppliers in Saudi Arabia have indicated they
A global survey showed that 60 percent of Taiwanese had attained higher education, second only to Canada, the Ministry of the Interior said. Taiwan easily surpassed the global average of 43 percent and ranked ahead of major economies, including Japan, South Korea and the US, data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) for 2024 showed. Taiwan has a high literacy rate, data released by the ministry showed. As of the end of last year, Taiwan had 20.617 million people aged 15 or older, accounting for 88.5 percent of the total population, with a literacy rate of 99.4 percent, the data
CCP ‘PAWN’? Beijing could use the KMT chairwoman’s visit to signal to the world that many people in Taiwan support the ‘one China’ principle, an academic said Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) yesterday arrived in China for a “peace” mission and potential meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), while a Taiwanese minister detailed the number of Chinese warships currently deployed around the nation. Cheng is visiting at a time of increased Chinese military pressure on Taiwan, as the opposition-dominated Legislative Yuan stalls a government plan for US$40 billion in extra defense spending. Speaking to reporters before going to the airport, Cheng said she was going on a “historic journey for peace,” but added that some people felt uneasy about her trip. “If you truly love Taiwan,
NEW LOW: The council in 2024 based predictions on a pessimistic estimate for the nation’s total fertility rate of 0.84, but last year that rate was 0.69, 17 percent lower An expected National Development Council (NDC) report expects the nation’s population to drop below 12 million by 2065, with the old-age dependency ratio to top 100 percent sooner than 2070, sources said yesterday. The council is slated to release its latest population projections in August, using an ultra-low fertility model, the sources said. The previous report projected that Taiwan’s population would fall to 14.37 million by 2070, but based on a new estimate of the total fertility rate (TFR) — the average number of children born to a woman over her lifetime — the population is expected to reach 12 million by
RSS