Two members of the Swedish parliament’s Committee on Foreign Affairs have urged their government and the EU to provide military support to Taiwan if needed.
Swedish lawmaker Joar Forssell of the Liberals on Saturday told Swedish broadcaster SVT that the EU and Sweden must assist Taiwan militarily if China attacks.
His comments came after Swedish lawmaker Markus Wiechel of the Sweden Democrats on Wednesday told the broadcaster the same thing.
Photo: Screengrab from SVT’s Web site
Sweden should sell weapons that Taiwan might want to buy without placing restrictions on the type of weapons being sold, Forssell said.
If Taiwan wanted to buy Sweden’s JAS fighter aircraft, “I think we should be happy about it,” he said.
“Offensive weapons are defensive in the case of democracies, because they are used as a deterrent,” he said in response to concerns that Taiwan might act offensively if it had the weapons.
It is “only reasonable” for Sweden to assist Taiwan militarily in the event of a Chinese attack, as authoritarian regimes such as China are trying to challenge democracy on the global stage, he said.
The democratic world should send a signal to China that if such an attack happened, it would come to Taiwan’s aid as it did for Ukraine, he said.
Asked whether it would be possible for Taiwanese troops to receive training in Sweden as Ukrainian troops did, Forssell said that it “would not be unreasonable.”
He acknowledged that there are challenges in doing so, but said: “We cannot let China dictate the terms of Swedish foreign policy.”
“The people of Taiwan have the right to decide their own future... It is our ... duty as free people to support their future freedom,” he wrote on Facebook on Saturday.
He said that Taiwan is “one of the world’s most developed democracies” and “undoubtedly already a state,” as it has territory, people and a legitimate government.
“If the Taiwanese people want to declare independence, it would be extremely presumptuous and strange not to call a spade a spade,” Forssell said.
Wiechel, who led a delegation to visit Taiwan last week, told SVT that “Taiwan should be supported in various ways just as we [Sweden] have supported Ukraine.”
He voiced concerns about stronger and more hostile totalitarian forces during a meeting with President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Thursday, calling on democratic allies to side with Taiwan.
Although the Sweden Democrats have increasingly profiled themselves as pro-Taiwanese, the party clarified that Wiechel’s position that the EU should assist Taiwan militarily is not its official stance, SVT reported.
AGING: While Japan has 22 submarines, Taiwan only operates four, two of which were commissioned by the US in 1945 and 1946, and transferred to Taiwan in 1973 Taiwan would need at least 12 submarines to reach modern fleet capabilities, CSBC Corp, Taiwan chairman Chen Cheng-hung (陳政宏) said in an interview broadcast on Friday, citing a US assessment. CSBC is testing the nation’s first indigenous defense submarine, the Hai Kun (海鯤, Narwhal), which is scheduled to be delivered to the navy next month or in July. The Hai Kun has completed torpedo-firing tests and is scheduled to undergo overnight sea trials, Chen said on an SET TV military affairs program. Taiwan would require at least 12 submarines to establish a modern submarine force after assessing the nation’s operational environment and defense
A white king snake that frightened passengers and caused a stir on a Taipei MRT train on Friday evening has been claimed by its owner, who would be fined, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. A person on Threads posted that he thought he was lucky to find an empty row of seats on Friday after boarding a train on the Bannan (Blue) Line, only to spot a white snake with black stripes after sitting down. Startled, he jumped up, he wrote, describing the encounter as “terrifying.” “Taipei’s rat control plan: Release snakes on the metro,” one person wrote in reply, referring
The coast guard today said that it had disrupted "illegal" operations by a Chinese research ship in waters close to the nation and driven it away, part of what Taipei sees a provocative pattern of China's stepped up maritime activities. The coast guard said that it on Thursday last week detected the Chinese ship Tongji (同濟號), which was commissioned only last year, 29 nautical miles (54km) southeast of the southern tip of Taiwan, although just outside restricted waters. The ship was observed lowering ropes into the water, suspected to be the deployment of scientific instruments for "illegal" survey operations, and the coast
An inauguration ceremony was held yesterday for the Danjiang Bridge, the world’s longest single-mast asymmetric cable-stayed bridge, ahead of its official opening to traffic on Tuesday, marking a major milestone after nearly three decades of planning and construction. At the ceremony in New Taipei City attended by President William Lai (賴清德), Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰), Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) and New Taipei City Mayor Hou Yu-ih (侯友宜), the bridge was hailed as both an engineering landmark and a long-awaited regional transport link connecting Tamsui (淡水) and Bali (八里)
RSS