Lithuania plans to open a representative office in Taiwan by the end of the year, Lithuanian Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Mantas Adomenas said, reflecting a desire for the two countries to forge closer ties.
A vice minister-level official from the Lithuanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs or Ministry of Economy and Innovation would attend the opening ceremony, Adomenas said in an online interview earlier this week.
“Opening an office [in Taiwan] is an important event,” he said.
Although no decision has been finalized on which official would attend, Adomenas, who has visited Taiwan several times, said he would like to visit the “lovely” nation again, describing Taiwan as “a very mature and very vibrant, dynamic democracy.”
The representative office could be named the “Lithuanian Representative Office” or the “Lithuanian Trade Representative Office,” but the title was still being discussed within the government, he said.
The Lithuanian Ministry of Economy and Innovation would run the office after it opens, Adomenas said.
“We very much hope we can develop mutually respectful relations with Taiwan and deepen economic and cultural relations,” he said.
Adomenas said that he expected the office to be organized similarly to Lithuanian embassies in other countries, with four to five officials and some locally hired staff.
As Lithuania and Taiwan do not have diplomatic relations, the Baltic state’s government has to amend laws to “create this new type of entity,” he said.
Once parliament opens its fall session, those amendments would be placed at the top of its agenda for review, Adomenas said, adding that after they are approved, the government would try to open the Taipei office by the end of this year.
On July 20, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) announced that Taiwan would open a representative office in Lithuania to expand its relations with the country and other Central European nations.
The office, to be named “The Taiwanese Representative Office in Lithuania,” would be located in the capital, Vilnius, Wu said.
It would be the first representative office Taiwan has opened in Europe since it set up an office in Slovakia in 2003, but no specific date has been set for the opening.
Taiwan from Thursday is to reinstate visa exemptions for passport holders from 65 countries. Mandatory quarantine for arriving travelers is to be lifted on Oct. 13 , when restrictions on inbound and outbound tour groups are also to be lifted. The following is a list of answers to common questions regarding how the new regulations are to affect inbound international visitors Which passports will have visa-free entry privileges? Eleven more countries on Thursday are to join 54 countries that were given visa-free privileges on Sept. 12. Passport holders from Japan, South Korea, Chile, Israel and Nicaragua can stay in Taiwan for up to 90 days without a visa. Taiwan is also to resume 30-day visa-free stays for citizens of the Dominican Republic, Singapore and Malaysia. Passport holders from Thailand, Brunei and the Philippines are to be allowed to stay in Taiwan for 14 days visa-free. Taiwan on Sept. 12 resumed 90-day visa-free entry for passport holders from the US, the UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia, New
HAWAII MODEL: While Hawaii held a referendum on becoming the 50th US state, Taiwan has never applied to join the People’s Republic of China, Miles Yu said China comparing Taiwanese independence to Hawaii seeking independence from the US is illogical, as Taiwan has never applied to be a part of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Hudson Institute senior fellow Miles Yu (余茂春) said over the weekend. Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅), who is in New York for the UN General Assembly, has given multiple talks asserting Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan. In a speech to the Asia Society on Thursday, Wang likened Taiwan to Hawaii. “Just as the US would not allow Hawaii to break away,” Beijing “reserves the right” to seek unification, Wang told the gathering. The
PRIDE AND FURY: Supporters of the Taiwan People’s Communist Party sang in Tainan, while Taiwan loyalists in Kaohsiung vowed to ‘protect Taiwan until death’ Two small Taiwanese groups at the far ends of the debate over relations with Beijing marked the National Day of the People’s Republic of China yesterday with flag raisings and flag burnings — opposite responses at a time of rising tension over the Taiwan Strait. Oct. 1 marks the day that Mao Zedong (毛澤東) proclaimed the People’s Republic of China in 1949, with the defeated Republic of China government fleeing to Taiwan at the end of that year, where — after democratic reforms — it remains to this day, neither recognizing the other. China’s national day is not officially marked in any
Tensions over Taiwan have raised the thorny issue of whether US troops based in South Korea would be involved in any conflict, with US and South Korean officials acknowledging that the peninsula could easily be dragged into a crisis. South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol told CNN in an interview aired on Sunday that his country was keen to work with the US to “expand freedom,” but that in a conflict over Taiwan, North Korea would be more likely to stage a provocation and that the alliance should focus on that first. North Korea has a mutual defense treaty with China, and military
RSS