The government is considering waiving the interest on Haiti’s debt to Taiwan for five years to help the earthquake-ravaged Caribbean ally rebuild its infrastructure, Minister of Foreign Affairs Timothy Yang (楊進添) said on Wednesday.
Asked why the government had not formulated a debt cancellation plan for Haiti as other countries did, Yang said the way Taiwan had offered loans to Haiti differed from other countries.
The money lent to Haiti was taken from the country’s foreign reserves via lending contracts with two commercial banks instead of directly from the treasury.
Since the debt was a commercial loan, the government could not write off its principal and could only waive the interest payments, Yang said.
The proposal is expected to be finalized “within a week or two,” pending approval of the Executive Yuan, Yang said when approached by reporters at an event for the rescue and medical teams who provided aid in Haiti.
Under the plan, the interest on the amount Haiti owes to two Taiwanese banks would be repaid using the ministry’s official budget, Yang said.
It has been reported that Taiwan holds at least US$91 million of Haiti’s estimated US$1 billion in foreign debt, but the government has refused to confirm the figure.
Yang did not reveal the amount of debt in the proposal, but said that, “it would be able to substantially reduce Haiti’s debt burden.”
As Haiti tries to recover from the disaster, Venezuela and the G7 — Canada, the US, the UK, France, Germany, Italy and Japan — have agreed to write off the country’s debts.
Actress Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛) has “returned home” to Taiwan, and there are no plans to hold a funeral for the TV star who died in Japan from influenza- induced pneumonia, her family said in a statement Wednesday night. The statement was released after local media outlets reported that Barbie Hsu’s ashes were brought back Taiwan on board a private jet, which arrived at Taipei Songshan Airport around 3 p.m. on Wednesday. To the reporters waiting at the airport, the statement issued by the family read “(we) appreciate friends working in the media for waiting in the cold weather.” “She has safely returned home.
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Twenty-four Republican members of the US House of Representatives yesterday introduced a concurrent resolution calling on the US government to abolish the “one China” policy and restore formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan. Led by US representatives Tom Tiffany and Scott Perry, the resolution calls for not only re-establishing formal relations, but also urges the US Trade Representative to negotiate a free-trade agreement (FTA) with Taiwan and for US officials to advocate for Taiwan’s full membership in the UN and other international organizations. In a news release announcing the resolution, Tiffany, who represents a Wisconsin district, called the “one China” policy “outdated, counterproductive
MUST REMAIN FREE: A Chinese takeover of Taiwan would lead to a global conflict, and if the nation blows up, the world’s factories would fall in a week, a minister said Taiwan is like Prague in 1938 facing Adolf Hitler; only if Taiwan remains free and democratic would the world be safe, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois Wu (吳志中) said in an interview with Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera. The ministry on Saturday said Corriere della Sera is one of Italy’s oldest and most read newspapers, frequently covers European economic and political issues, and that Wu agreed to an interview with the paper’s senior political analyst Massimo Franco in Taipei on Jan. 3. The interview was published on Jan. 26 with the title “Taiwan like Prague in 1938 with Hitler,” the ministry