Washington will work hard to have a “positive and constructive” relationship with president-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), a US expert on Asia said on Monday.
“The US has a vital interest in what it considers to be the status quo — maintaining peace and stability,” said Alan Romberg, director of the East Asia program at the Washington-based Stimson Center.
He said that whatever else happens after Tsai takes office on May 20, China would also work hard to maintain links with Taiwan’s private sector and local governments.
“They don’t want to destroy what they have achieved and to the degree that they have won some hearts and minds they will want to retain them,” Romberg told a review of the Jan. 16 election results hosted by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.
Romberg, a former US Department of State official, spoke along with Douglas Paal, a former director of the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) who is now the vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment.
Romberg said that while Tsai would not embrace the so-called “1992 consensus” as demanded by Beijing, she has made it clear that her administration would not be pursuing independence.
He said the four-month gap between the election of a president and that president assuming power on May 20 was “unacceptable.”
It was “intolerable” to have an elected government that could not function in all aspects because of the four-month gap, he said.
Over the next few years, Tsai should move to close this gap, he said, adding: “It needs to be fixed.”
The endowment said that “the domestic implications of Taiwan’s legislative and presidential elections will be important for the region as China’s slowing economy and Taiwan’s growing resistance to mainland influence continue to play out.”
“The reformulation will be the subject of intense jockeying within Taiwan and between Taiwan and the mainland, with uncertain implications not only for future cross-strait relations, but also for US interests and the American role in the US-China-Taiwan triangular relationship,” it said.
Paal said that a lot of hope had been placed on reviving Taiwan’s economy with the change in government.
Regional conditions could make this very difficult, but a new study by the Peterson Institute for International Economics on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal contained good news for Taiwan, he said.
The study showed that even without joining the TPP, Taiwan’s economy would eventually benefit by about US$1 billion a year as a result of increased regional trade stemming from the agreement, he said.
He also praised Tsai’s incoming Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration.
“This is not your father’s DPP,” he said.
“It has more organized, disciplined and rational policies and party activities. And it has clear, steady leadership at the top that we have not seen before — high-quality people,” Paal said.
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