President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday underscored her administration’s intent to cement Taiwan-US relations as she welcomed a delegation of US lawmakers led by US Representative Mike Rogers, chairman of the US House of Representatives Armed Services Committee.
“We thank the US Congress for consistently showing bipartisan concern for Taiwan’s security and its show of support [for the nation] through concrete actions,” Tsai told the delegation at the Presidential Office in Taipei.
The nation expresses gratitude to committee members for their continued efforts to “include policy measures in the annual renewal of the National Defense Authorization Act that enhanced Taiwan’s defensive capabilities,” she said.
Photo: CNA
“Deepening the security cooperation between Taiwan and the US is crucial for maintaining the security of Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific region,” Tsai said.
Members of the committee demonstrated their attentiveness to developments on the international stage and challenges to democracies, she said, adding that the committee has “protected the national security of the US and its democratic allies.”
Tsai also thanked the US Congress for its support in facilitating the signing of the first agreement under the US-Taiwan Initiative on 21st-Century Trade earlier this month, which “marked a new milestone in Taiwan-US trade and economic relations.”
Taipei intends to accelerate its efforts with Washington to create a comprehensive solution to double taxation affecting Taiwanese and US businesspeople to promote economic exchanges between the two countries, she said.
The Presidential Office in a news release cited Rogers as saying that Taiwan and the US share a long and important friendship based on the common values of the rule of law, democracy, and the belief in a free and open Indo-Pacific region.
The bipartisan congressional delegation led by Rogers includes US representatives Adam Smith, Joe Courtney, John Garamendi, Jill Tokuda, David Rouzer, Gary Palmer, James Moylan and Corry Mills.
In other news, Nikki Haley, a former US ambassador to the UN and a Republican presidential hopeful, on Tuesday said that Washington and its allies should “give Taiwan everything it needs to defend itself,” and make clear to Beijing that aggression would mean “a full-blown economic decoupling that would massively damage China.”
Beijing is “an enemy” to the US and “the most dangerous opponent we have faced since World War II,” Haley said in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington.
“The [Chinese] Communist Party’s endgame is clear. China is preparing its people for war. [Chinese] President Xi [Jinping, 習近平] has openly said it,” she said. “We should take him at his word and act accordingly.”
The US must get Europe to recognize the threat China poses to its security and shake the bloc out of its slumber, Haley said.
Washington should deepen military cooperation with Japan, South Korea, Australia and other partners in the Indo-Pacific region, she said.
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
RSS