The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday declined to comment after former White House national security adviser John Bolton questioned US President Donald Trump’s commitment to Taiwan.
In his book The Room Where it Happened: A White House Memoir, Bolton wrote that Trump had sought the help of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) for his re-election bid in November and that the president was “particularly dyspeptic” about Taiwan.
Trump often compared Taiwan to the tip of his Sharpies pen and China to his Resolute desk, he wrote.
Xi had urged the Trump administration not to allow President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) to travel to the US or to sell arms to Taiwan, while US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo once held back a congressional notification on an F-16 sale to Taiwan as he was worried that Trump might refuse to proceed with it, Bolton wrote.
Bolton served as national security adviser from April 2018 to September last year.
Asked to comment on Bolton’s book, ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou (歐江安) at a regular news briefing in Taipei yesterday said that the ministry had no comment on the publication of the book, while reaffirming strong Taiwan-US ties.
Since Trump took office in January 2017, the US has repeatedly reiterated its commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act and the “six assurances,” while approving six arms sales, including a package that includes MK-48 Heavy Weight Torpedoes that was announced last month, she said.
Both nations have continued to boost their interactions, as demonstrated by Tsai’s transits in New York and Denver in July last year on her way to four Caribbean allies, she added.
Tsai’s transits in the two cities marked the longest time that a Taiwanese president had stayed in the US, Ou said.
Tsai also attended events at the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office alongside allies’ permanent representatives to the UN, also a breakthrough, she said.
The nation would continue to deepen its partnerships with the US based on mutual trust, she added.
President Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) administration is seeking to join an Indo-Pacific economic framework being planned by the US, a senior official said. The government is paying close attention to the regional economic pact being touted by US President Joe Biden, although too few details have emerged from Washington for Taipei to make specific plans, the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. The US is expected to launch the Indo-Pacific economic framework next month after negotiations with Australia, India and Japan, the official said. The economic initiative is to tackle trade facilitation, standards for the digital economy and technology, supply-chain resiliency and
PIVOTAL ROLE: Taiwan’s importance in the global chip supply chain can be bolstered by domestic equipment manufacturing, President Tsai Ing-wen said Efforts must be made to better secure Taiwan’s place in the global supply chain by localizing production of equipment and facilities used by the semiconductor industry, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday. Tsai discussed the issue during a meeting with representatives from the Taiwan Electronic Equipment Industry Association at the Presidential Office in Taipei. Product shortages throughout the COVID-19 pandemic — particularly of automotive chips — highlighted the pivotal role of Taiwan in the global supply chain, she said. Tsai thanked the association for cooperating with the government on the shared goal of localizing production of important semiconductor industry equipment.
SEPARATE CASE? A woman tested positive when she went with her daughter to be tested, because her daughter had taken the same bus to school as a steakhouse worker The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) yesterday reported 10 local COVID-19 cases, six of whom had visited a steakhouse in Taoyuan where an infection cluster has been reported. Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中), who heads the center, said that of the 10 local infections, one case — No. 17,928 — is a Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport disease prevention staffer who works in the area where inbound travelers collect their saliva for a COVID-19 polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test, and sometimes at the fever screening station. The staffer had tested negative in a PCR test on Jan. 9 and
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is to use non-fungible tokens (NFTs) in a bid to revitalize the party’s archives, KMT officials said yesterday at a news conference in Taipei that showcased a ceremonial sword belonging to Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石), the first piece of the collection to be utilized in the project. NFTs are a blockchain technology used for digital files that provide proof of ownership or a certificate of authenticity. KMT Culture and Communications Committee deputy director-general Lin Chia-hsing (林家興), who is also the curator of the archives, said that digitizing the collection is part of the party’s efforts to revamp its
RSS