Taiwan’s embassy in Port-au-Prince would continue to work with the new government as it seeks to restore order after months of gang-related violence, while maintaining Taiwan-Haiti ties, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday.
Haiti’s Transitional Presidential Council, created in April to re-establish democratic order in the nation, signed a decree on Nov. 10 to fire then-interim Haitian prime minister Garry Conille after five months, replacing him with Alix Didier Fils-Aime, a businessman who was previously considered for the job, The Associated Press reported on Monday last week.
Council chairman Leslie Voltaire and Fils-Aime on Saturday inaugurated Haiti’s reshuffled government at Villa d’Accueil in Musseau.
Photo: AFP
The new Cabinet comprises 18 ministers, signaling a new chapter in the transition after the firing of Conille as the country grapples with mounting insecurity and political instability, the online newspaper Haitian Times reported on Monday.
In Taipei, Cheng Li-cheng (鄭力城), head of the ministry’s Latin American and Caribbean Affairs Department, confirmed that Fils-Aime was named the new prime minister on Monday last week and that his Cabinet was inaugurated on Saturday.
Ambassador to Haiti Hu Cheng-hao (胡正浩) was invited to the inauguration event, where he expressed the government’s willingness to deepen bilateral cooperation with the new administration, Cheng said.
The ambassador also expressed that Taiwan’s embassy would continue to cooperate with the new government to assist it in the country’s transition process and to maintain its friendship with Haiti, he said.
Regarding security issues in the Caribbean country, Cheng said local gang violence in the Solino neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, the capital, has forced many residents to flee the area in the past few days.
The US Federal Aviation Administration has since Tuesday last week banned US flights to Haiti for 30 days after gangs shot at three planes, he added.
Taiwan’s embassy in Haiti is still open, and consular employees and their family members, as well as Taiwanese in Haiti are safe, Cheng said, adding that the embassy continues to keep close contact with Haiti’s police and armed forces, other countries embassies in the nation and the foreign ministry.
The Executive Yuan yesterday announced that registration for a one-time universal NT$10,000 cash handout to help people in Taiwan survive US tariffs and inflation would start on Nov. 5, with payouts available as early as Nov. 12. Who is eligible for the handout? Registered Taiwanese nationals are eligible, including those born in Taiwan before April 30 next year with a birth certificate. Non-registered nationals with residence permits, foreign permanent residents and foreign spouses of Taiwanese citizens with residence permits also qualify for the handouts. For people who meet the eligibility requirements, but passed away between yesterday and April 30 next year, surviving family members
The German city of Hamburg on Oct. 14 named a bridge “Kaohsiung-Brucke” after the Taiwanese city of Kaohsiung. The footbridge, formerly known as F566, is to the east of the Speicherstadt, the world’s largest warehouse district, and connects the Dar-es-Salaam-Platz to the Brooktorpromenade near the Port of Hamburg on the Elbe River. Timo Fischer, a Free Democratic Party member of the Hamburg-Mitte District Assembly, in May last year proposed the name change with support from members of the Social Democratic Party and the Christian Democratic Union. Kaohsiung and Hamburg in 1999 inked a sister city agreement, but despite more than a quarter-century of
Taiwanese officials are courting podcasters and influencers aligned with US President Donald Trump as they grow more worried the US leader could undermine Taiwanese interests in talks with China, people familiar with the matter said. Trump has said Taiwan would likely be on the agenda when he is expected to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) next week in a bid to resolve persistent trade tensions. China has asked the White House to officially declare it “opposes” Taiwanese independence, Bloomberg reported last month, a concession that would mark a major diplomatic win for Beijing. President William Lai (賴清德) and his top officials
‘ONE CHINA’: A statement that Berlin decides its own China policy did not seem to sit well with Beijing, which offered only one meeting with the German official German Minister for Foreign Affairs Johann Wadephul’s trip to China has been canceled, a spokesperson for his ministry said yesterday, amid rising tensions between the two nations, including over Taiwan. Wadephul had planned to address Chinese curbs on rare earths during his visit, but his comments about Berlin deciding on the “design” of its “one China” policy ahead of the trip appear to have rankled China. Asked about Wadephul’s comments, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Guo Jiakun (郭嘉昆) said the “one China principle” has “no room for any self-definition.” In the interview published on Thursday, Wadephul said he would urge China to
RSS