Taipei is unlikely to consider resuming diplomatic relations with Managua unless its “authoritarian” leader, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, steps down, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Alexander Yui (俞大㵢) said yesterday.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Liao Wan-ju (廖婉汝) at the legislature in Taipei asked Yui whether there was a possibility that ties with the Central American nation could be resumed after Nicaragua in December last year established formal ties with Beijing.
Taipei cut its diplomatic relationship with Managua shortly afterward.
Photo: Tien Yu-hua, Taipei Times
“There is no possibility unless there is a change of regime” in Nicaragua, Yui said. “After all, [Ortega] also severed ties with us during his previous administration.”
In 1985, Ortega’s government ended 55 years of formal links with Taipei and switched recognition to Beijing.
After Violeta Barrios Torres de Chamorro replaced him as president in 1990, ties with Taiwan resumed.
Ortega had maintained ties with Taipei after he returned to office in 2007 until last year.
Taipei has attributed the latest change of diplomatic recognition to geopolitics.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) last year said that the intensifying conflict between the US-led democracy camp and the China-Russia-led authoritarian camp was the main reason for Taiwan’s loss of the Central American country as an ally.
Ortega in November last year won a fourth consecutive term in an election that was seen by some as controversial.
In response to Ortega’s win, Washington sanctioned Nicaragua, which was probably why Ortega allied himself with China and Russia, Wu said.
At yesterday’s Foreign and National Defense Committee hearing in Taipei, lawmakers reviewed documents concerning Taiwan’s decision to cease its free-trade agreement with Nicaragua.
Bilateral trade between Taiwan and Nicaragua totaled US$166.5 million last year, with exports to the former ally totaling US$22.94 million, government data showed.
That accounted for a mere 0.01 percent of Taiwan’s total exports last year, so ending the agreement had little effect on foreign trade, Ministry of Economic Affairs officials said.
The termination of ties with Nicaragua left the nation with 14 diplomatic allies worldwide.
Since President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) took office in 2016, Taiwan has lost eight diplomatic allies.
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