The government is still awaiting a response from South Africa regarding its demand that Taiwan’s representative office be relocated from Pretoria and renamed by the end of last month.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Hsiao Kuang-wei (蕭光偉) yesterday said that Taipei has proposed talks with Pretoria regarding its delegation in the country and is potentially open to signing a new agreement, but the South African side has not responded.
As of yesterday morning, the Taipei Liaison Office in the Republic of South Africa was operating normally in Pretoria, he said.
Photo: CNA
Last year, the South African government demanded that the office be categorized as a “trade office” and moved from Pretoria to the commercial capital, Johannesburg.
It initially set the deadline as October last year, before extending it to the end of last month.
South Africa unilaterally changed the name of the Taipei office on its Department of International Relations and Cooperation Web site from the “Taipei Liaison Office” to the “Taipei Commercial Office” early last month.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs protested the move, calling for talks between the two sides.
Taiwan has said that China was behind the South African government’s push to relocate and rename the office, as Pretoria has cited UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 and Beijing’s “one China principle” as the reasons for the change.
The resolution was adopted in 1971 to address the issue of China’s representation in the global body, resulting in the Republic of China losing its UN seat to the People’s Republic of China.
After South Africa severed diplomatic ties with Taiwan in 1998, Taiwan established a representative office in Pretoria under the name Taipei Liaison Office based on a 1997 agreement.
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