Economist Jeffrey Sachs on Monday urged Taiwan and China to commit to dialogue to find a peaceful resolution amid rising cross-strait tensions.
“We need dialogue urgently, because if it’s only taking the worst of the other side and that is what’s happening right now, we will get into an escalation cycle ... we are in an escalation cycle that’s very dangerous,” Sachs said via videoconference.
He was speaking at a Tang Prize Forum at National Cheng Kung University in Tainan. Sachs has won this year’s Tang Prize for Sustainable Development.
Photo: CNA
Taiwanese academics asked Sachs about the relationship between Taiwan, China and the US, particularly following US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taipei last month. Beijing launched live-fire drills in the waters around Taiwan immediately after Pelosi’s departure.
Sachs said he believes dialogue is the best option, as it would allow all parties to understand each other’s respective position, interests and security needs.
“I hope I’m not naive in believing that there is an absolutely peaceful and mutually constructive approach, that is my strong view. And it’s not only my hope, it’s also my understanding, but we’re not naturally gravitating towards that right now because there is very little trust and very little discussion,” he said.
It is important for all sides to aim at cooperation instead of taking provocative or dangerous actions, because the economic cost of the loss of trust are extremely high, Sachs said, citing the benefits of having an integrated power grid in Northeast Asia.
“There’s no reason that Taiwan cannot power itself with Gobi Desert renewable energy, because there could be a regional grid,” he said. “But this requires trust, this requires a sense of security and national security, and that trust doesn’t exist right now.”
Referring to the distance of about 250km from Xiamen, China, to Taichung, he said: “That’s a pretty routine submarine cable, so one could, if there were a high level of trust, connect the mainland and Taiwan power grid, and make all sorts of solutions that don’t exist right now.”
Sachs is recognized for his bold and effective strategies to address complex challenges, such as extreme poverty, climate change, international debt and financial crises, national economic reforms, and the control of pandemics and epidemics.
To address issues related to sustainable development, Sachs combined the fields of economics, public health, equity and sustainability to pioneer a multidisciplinary approach, transforming sustainable development into an integrated field of study and practice, the Tang Prize Foundation has said.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
A bipartisan group of US senators has introduced a bill to enhance cooperation with Taiwan on drone development and to reduce reliance on supply chains linked to China. The proposed Blue Skies for Taiwan Act of 2026 was introduced by Republican US senators Ted Cruz and John Curtis, and Democratic US senators Jeff Merkley and Andy Kim. The legislation seeks to ease constraints on Taiwan-US cooperation in uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), including dependence on China-sourced components, limited access to capital and regulatory barriers under US export controls, a news release issued by Cruz on Wednesday said. The bill would establish a "Blue UAS
RSS