The messages brought back by the country’s last ambassador to the Gambia Samuel Chen (陳士良) yesterday was that Gambian President Yahya Jammeh considered the limit of Taiwan’s financial assistance for Gambia to not be in the “strategic national interests” of his country, diplomatic sources said.
In response to Jammeh’s decision to break off relations with Taiwan on Nov. 14 for reasons of “strategic national interests,” the Taiwan government on Monday announced the termination of bilateral ties to safeguard the nation’s dignity and the principles of its foreign aid policy aimed to stop “checkbook diplomacy.”
At a legislative meeting on Monday, Minister of Foreign Affairs David Lin (林永樂) said Jammeh had made “exorbitant demands” for aid from Taiwan, in an apparent move to confirm the assertion made by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lin Yu-fang (林郁方) that Jammeh in January had requested more than US$10 million in cash without specified purposes.
David Lin told lawmakers at that time that the request by Jammeh was “unacceptable” and that “we were unable to satisfy his request.”
Diplomatic sources said the ministry yesterday reaffirmed that at the center of Jammeh’s strategic thoughts on national interests was the scale of foreign aid his country can receive from Taiwan and other donor nations.
Chen went to the ministry to report to Lin about the case straight from the airport. The meeting lasted five hours.
The stated purpose of Jammeh’s request of US$10 million was “national security,” which was more like a blank check than a project-orientated request that has to be implemented in line with the three principles — justifiable purposes, legal procedures and effective implementation — under the ministry’s foreign aid policy, sources said.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday said it opposes the introduction of migrant workers from India until a mechanism is in place to prevent workers from absconding. Minister of Labor Hung Sun-han (洪申翰) on Thursday told the Legislative Yuan that the first group of migrant workers from India could be introduced as early as this year, as part of a government program. The caucus’ opposition to the policy is based on the assessment that “the risk is too high,” KMT caucus secretary-general Lin Pei-hsiang (林沛祥) said. Taiwan has a serious and long-standing problem of migrant workers absconding from their contracts, indicating that
SPACE VETERAN: Kjell N. Lindgren, who helps lead NASA’s human spaceflight missions, has been on two expeditions on the ISS and has spent 311 days in space Taiwan-born US astronaut Kjell N. Lindgren is to visit Taiwan to promote technological partnerships through one of the programs organized by the US for its 250th national anniversary. Lindgren would be in Taiwan from Tuesday to Saturday next week as part of the US Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ US Speaker Program, organized to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) said in a statement yesterday. Lindgren plans to engage with key leaders across the nation “to advance cutting-edge technological partnerships and inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers,”
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