The US should formally recognize Taiwan as an independent nation, and end its outdated and counterproductive “one China” policy, US Representative Tom Tiffany and 18 other US lawmakers wrote in a petition.
“It is time to change the status quo and recognize the reality denied by the US government for decades: Taiwan is an independent nation,” Tiffany told the Epoch Times. “As our long-standing and valued partner, correctly acknowledging their independence from communist China is long overdue.”
The resolution also asks the administration of US President Joe Biden to support Taiwan’s membership in international organizations and to negotiate a bilateral free-trade agreement, the newspaper said.
Photo: Bloomberg
Tiffany said in a separate interview with New Tang Dynasty TV on Wednesday that he thinks Taiwan should be recognized as a free, democratic and peace-loving nation.
“There are more and more people in [the US] Congress that are understanding how important Taiwan is, and how important it is that we recognize Taiwan, and that we trade with Taiwan,” he told the channel.
Separately, US arms sales to Taiwan are expected to be a key issue for the newly created US House of Representatives Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the US and the Chinese Communist Party, a report published by the Roll Call newspaper said on Tuesday.
“How do we prevent Taiwan’s future from becoming Ukraine’s present? I think it is going to be a theme of what we do on this committee,” US Representative Mike Gallagher, who chairs the committee, told the newspaper in an interview.
Gallagher also said that he would examine the reasons for a US$18 billion backlog of military equipment that has been approved for sale to Taiwan.
US sectors that “may be too economically dependent on China” or “corrupted by Chinese money and influence operations” would be scrutinized by the committee, Gallagher said.
Chinese property acquisitions near US military bases and suspected Chinese police outposts in the country would also be addressed, he said.
Discussions on Chinese police operating overseas would also include Beijing’s efforts to “coerce or apply pressure to Chinese citizens living abroad,” as well as Americans of Chinese descent, he added.
The committee would also discuss banning social media app TikTok and other topics, he said.
Members of the committee would make policy recommendations, suggest policy changes and highlight initiatives led by allies in the Indo-Pacific region, Gallagher said.
However, funding would be outside the committee’s purview, he added.
‘UNFRIENDLY’: Changing the nationality listing of Taiwanese residents to ‘China’ goes against EU foreign policy as well as democratic and human rights principles, MOFA said Taiwan yesterday called on Denmark to correct its designation of the nationality of Taiwanese residents as “China” or face retaliatory measures. The Danish government in 2024 changed the nationality of Taiwanese citizens on their residence permits from “Taiwan” to “China.” The decision goes against EU foreign policy and contravenes democratic and human rights principles, Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) spokesman Hsiao Kuang-wei (蕭光偉) said. Denmark should present a solution acceptable to Taiwan as soon as possible and correct the erroneous designation to preserve the longstanding friendship between the two nations, Hsiao said. The issue could damage Denmark’s image and business reputation in Taiwan,
Taiwan climbed to its highest position in global export rankings in more than three decades last year, buoyed by demand linked to artificial intelligence (AI) that lifted shipments of semiconductors and technology products, Ministry of Finance data released yesterday showed. Taiwan accounted for 2.4 percent of global exports last year, or about US$640 billion, ranking 12th worldwide, the data showed. That was up four places from a year earlier and marked the nation’s best ranking since 1994, the ministry said. Taiwan’s share of global exports rose by 0.5 percentage points from the previous year, the largest increase among major economies, reflecting the nation’s
The nation’s fastest supercomputer, Nano 4 (晶創26), is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, and would be used to train large language models in finance and national defense sectors, the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) said. The supercomputer, which would operate at about 86.05 petaflops, is being tested at a new cloud computing center in the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The exterior of the server cabinet features chip circuitry patterns overlaid with a map of Taiwan, highlighting the nation’s central position in the semiconductor industry. The center also houses Taiwania 2, Taiwania 3, Forerunner 1 and
FIRST TRIAL: Ko’s lawyers sought reduced bail and other concessions, as did other defendants, but the bail judge denied their requests, citing the severity of the sentences Former Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) was yesterday sentenced to 17 years in prison and had his civil rights suspended for six years over corruption, embezzlement and other charges. Taipei prosecutors in December last year asked the Taipei District Court for a combined 28-year, six-month sentence for the four cases against Ko, who founded the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The cases were linked to the Core Pacific City (京華城購物中心) redevelopment project and the mismanagement of political donations. Other defendants convicted on separate charges included Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Angela Ying (應曉薇), who was handed a 15-year, six-month sentence; Core Pacific
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