The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) on Monday ordered Honduras to vacate its embassy in Taiwan within 30 days of Sunday after Tegucigalpa made a similar demand of Taiwan.
Taipei on Monday announced that it had cut ties with Honduras after the Central American nation earlier said in a statement that it had established ties with Beijing and ended its diplomatic relationship with Taiwan.
Following the announcements, Honduran Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Antonio Garcia spoke on Honduran television saying that Taiwan would be required to vacate its embassy in the Honduran capital.
Photo: AFP
In Taipei, MOFA later told a news conference that “according to the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and the principle of reciprocity,” Honduras must vacate its embassy in Taipei within 30 days of Sunday, which is when it cut ties with Honduras.
Honduras asked Taiwan to vacate the Tegucigalpa embassy within 30 days of Saturday.
MOFA spokesman Jeff Liu (劉永健) yesterday said that the difference in dates was due to the time difference between the two countries.
Photo: AFP
A task force has been sent to Honduras to help embassy staff with evacuation procedures, Liu said.
MOFA has appealed to the Honduran government to provide assistance and to allow embassy staff to complete their exit safely and securely, he said.
MOFA had records of 61 Taiwanese, including those employed by Taipei and their dependents, in Honduras at the time that ties were severed, he said.
The state employees were working either at the embassy or on development projects in the country, he said, adding that MOFA would assist them with repatriation or relocation to other ally nations in the region.
As the embassy property in Honduras was leased, there would be no issue with settling assets, he said.
Honduran scholarship students in Taiwan would be allowed to finish this semester and flight tickets would be provided to them after the end of the semester, Liu said.
He also commented on China’s announcement that it would accept Honduran students studying in Taiwan at its universities.
As a free and democratic society, Taiwan provides a better learning environment than China, he said.
There are 359 Honduran students in Taiwan, including 220 in formal degree programs, 138 in language programs and one exchange student.
The severance of ties follows 82 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries.
Honduras in the past few years has made increasingly greater financial demands of Taiwan and threatened to cut ties in favor of China.
During his speech on Monday, Garcia said that China might invest up to US$10 billion in Honduras to boost the country’s labor market.
FINAL COUNTDOWN: About 50,000 attended a pro-recall rally yesterday, while the KMT and the TPP plan to rally against the recall votes today Democracy activists, together with arts and education representatives, yesterday organized a motorcade, while thousands gathered on Ketagalan Boulevard in Taipei in the evening in support of tomorrow’s recall votes. Recall votes for 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers and suspended Hsinchu City mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) are to be held tomorrow, while recall votes for seven other KMT lawmakers are scheduled for Aug. 23. The afternoon motorcade was led by the Spring Breeze Culture and Arts Foundation, the Tyzen Hsiao Foundation and the Friends of Lee Teng-hui Association, and was joined by delegates from the Taiwan Statebuilding Party and the Taiwan Solidarity
‘NON-RED’: Taiwan and Ireland should work together to foster a values-driven, democratic economic system, leveraging their complementary industries, Lai said President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday expressed hopes for closer ties between Taiwan and Ireland, and that both countries could collaborate to create a values-driven, democracy-centered economic system. He made the remarks while meeting with an Irish cross-party parliamentary delegation visiting Taiwan. The delegation, led by John McGuinness, deputy speaker of the Irish house of representatives, known as the Dail, includes Irish lawmakers Malcolm Byrne, Barry Ward, Ken O’Flynn and Teresa Costello. McGuinness, who chairs the Ireland-Taiwan Parliamentary Friendship Association, is a friend of Taiwan, and under his leadership, the association’s influence has grown over the past few years, Lai said. Ireland is
Instead of threatening tariffs on Taiwan-made chips, the US should try to reinforce cooperation with Taiwan on semiconductor development to take on challenges from the People’s Republic of China (PRC), a Taiwanese think tank said. The administration of US President Donald Trump has threatened to impose across-the-board import duties of 32 percent on Taiwan-made goods and levy a separate tariff on semiconductors, which Taiwan is hoping to avoid. The Research Institute for Democracy, Society, and Emerging Technology (DSET), a National Science and Technology Council think tank, said that US efforts should focus on containing China’s semiconductor rise rather than impairing Taiwan. “Without
An SOS message in a bottle has been found in Ireland that is believed to have come from the Taiwanese captain of fishing vessel Yong Yu Sing No. 18 (永裕興18號), who has been missing without a trace for over four years, along with nine Indonesian crew members. The vessel, registered to Suao (蘇澳), went missing near Hawaii on Dec. 30, 2020. The ship has since been recovered, but the 10 crew members have never been found. The captain, surnamed Lee (李), is believed to have signed the note with his name. A post appeared on Reddit on Tuesday after a man
RSS