Taiwan must fearlessly and confidently continue to “tell the world that Taiwan is important,” former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday after arriving back in the country from her European trip.
“Taiwan’s stride toward the world will not stop, and we must speed up the pace,” she wrote on Facebook, shortly after returning from a weeklong trip in Europe that included high-profile visits in the Czech Republic, France and Belgium.
“Be fearless and confident, and tell the world that Taiwan is important! Taiwan matters!” she wrote.
Photo: Tony Yao, Taipei Times
Tsai said she shared “Taiwan’s democratic experience with the world” in the Czech Republic and the nation’s “democratic spirit of freedom, equality and fraternity” in France.
In Belgium, she expressed Taiwan’s hope that Europe would “continue to support Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations,” she said.
Tsai, who was president from 2016 to May this year, also thanked the Taiwanese public who showed up to support the nation during her trip. The “warmth” of Taiwanese provides “strength” in “moving us toward the world together,” she said.
Separately yesterday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement citing key moments of Tsai’s trip.
The statement including Tsai shaking hands with Czech President Petr Pavel at Forum 2000 in Prague, where she delivered a speech with the title “Overcoming Authoritarian Threat through Democratic Unity.”
It also cited Tsai’s presence at the MEDEF International, a French business organization, the French Senate and the Universite Paris-Saclay, as well as the attendance of more than 30 members of the European Parliament, including its Vice-President Pina Picierno, at a reception for Tsai at the European Parliament’s complex in Brussels.
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