Staff Reporter, in Asuncion
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said on Thursday that he was still negotiating with China about a plan to stop Taiwan and China from wooing each other’s diplomatic allies — what he calls his “diplomatic truce” strategy, but critics have dubbed it a “one-sided declaration.”
“If the diplomatic truce turns out to be a successful strategy, it might be possible that we won’t gain any more allies, but we won’t lose any either,” Ma said.
Ma said he understood that some people disagree with the strategy, but the government should still pursue the goal as it is in the interest of Taiwan.
He made the remarks at a press conference held in Asuncion on Thursday.
During his first state visit to attend yesterday’s inauguration of new Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo and today’s inauguration of the re-elected Dominican Republic President Leonel Fernandez, Ma took the opportunity to explain his ideas on the “diplomatic truce.”
Ma said he had gained support for the idea from the diplomatic community in Taiwan, US friends in think tanks, the legislative and executive branches and the country’s allies.
Presidential Office Spokesman Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦) said Panamanian President Martin Torrijos had praised the “diplomatic strategy” as a “wise decision” and Lugo called it the “correct direction” during their separate meetings with Ma over the last two days.
Taiwan has 23 diplomatic allies — mostly small nations in Africa, Latin America and the South Pacific — while about 170 countries recognize China.
After assuming office in May, Ma called for a diplomatic truce with China, saying both sides should not compete for recognition by offering large sums of money, a practice critics call “checkbook diplomacy.”
If both sides of the Strait can refrain from engaging in checkbook diplomacy, donations to less developed countries would be purely foreign aid and not part of a vicious competition, Ma said.
Taiwan and China’s checkbook diplomacy battle is often criticized by the international community, but giving donations to less developed countries is what Taiwan should do as it can help resolve problems derived from uneven global development, Ma said.
“As a member of the world, we are obliged to help other countries. Taiwan benefited from aid from the US and other countries in the past,” Ma said.
SMALL RESPITE: The past few rainy days, which came after one month of virtually no rain on the west coast, did not ease Taiwan’s water shortage problems, the CWB said A weather system from southern China has over the past three days replenished Taiwan’s reservoirs with almost 16 million tonnes of water, giving Taiwan a slight relief from a water shortage, the Water Resources Agency (WRA) said yesterday. From 12am on Tuesday to 4pm yesterday, about 15.97 million tonnes fell in the catchment areas of the nation’s reservoirs, which is slightly more than Taiwan’s average daily water use, it said. However, the rain would ease today, with only isolated showers forecast in Hualien and Taitung counties, as well as in southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Bureau (CWB) said. For other regions, cloudy to
A debt dispute between a restaurant owner and a criminal ring might be behind a bizarre cockroach attack at the Taipei eatery on Monday night while it was hosting a police gathering, Taipei Police Commissioner Chen Jia-chang (陳嘉昌) said yesterday. Preliminary findings of a police investigation into the case at the G House Taipei suggest that the unusual incident might have been directed at the restaurant’s owner, who allegedly owes money to the Bamboo Union, Chen said. The suspects were Bamboo Union members and there was no evidence indicating that the cockroaches were targeted at the police officers at the restaurant, he
Taiwan’s armed forces should closely monitor China’s development of a new tanker aircraft, as it would significantly boost the Chinese air force’s capability to carry out long-range raids, a military expert said on Wednesday. Ou Si-fu (歐錫富), a research fellow at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said in an online article that China is developing a tanker variant of its Y-20 military transport aircraft, known as the Y-20U. The Y-20 has a maximum take-off weight of 220 tonnes and the tanker variant is expected to carry up to 60 tonnes of fuel, more than three times the maximum
TRAVELING WHILE CONTAGIOUS: The highest risk of infection is indoors, especially in settings where people take off their masks to eat and drink, an expert warned The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday posted a list of places visited by people who were recently diagnosed with COVID-19 while they were likely contagious, urging people who visited the sites at the same time to practice self-health management. Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, said that confirmed case No. 1,129 — a woman in her 60s who works at Novotel Taipei Taoyuan International Airport, a designated quarantine facility, and tested positive on Friday — visited Chiayi between Friday last week and Monday. On the first day of her trip, she visited the Big Chiayi
RSS