Three US senators are visiting Taiwan this week and would discuss trade and other issues with President William Lai (賴清德), a trip that comes as Taipei pushes ahead with tariff talks with Washington.
The American Institute in Taiwan said in a statement yesterday that Republican senators Pete Ricketts and Ted Budd, along with Democratic Senator Chris Coons, were visiting until Saturday as part of a broader visit to the region.
While US lawmakers regularly visit Taiwan, this is the first since US President Donald Trump took office in January.
Photo: Ann Wang, Reuters
Taiwan, which had been due to be hit with 32 percent levies as part of Trump’s now-paused tariff regime, held its first round of direct talks with US officials last week to discuss the issue.
“The delegation will engage in a series of high-level meetings with senior Taiwan leaders to discuss US-Taiwan relations, regional security, trade and investment, and other significant issues of mutual interest,” the institute said.
“Their visit underscores the United States’ commitment to its partnership with Taiwan and reaffirms our shared commitment to strengthening a Free and Open Indo-Pacific,” it said.
The US is Taiwan’s most important international backer and arms supplier, despite the lack of formal diplomatic ties.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the senators would meet with Lai and other senior leaders to discuss the “close partnership” between Taiwan and the US, the security situation in the Taiwan Strait and the strengthening of security in the Indo-Pacific region.
Ricketts is chair of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific and International Cybersecurity Policy.
Left-Handed Girl (左撇子女孩), a film by Taiwanese director Tsou Shih-ching (鄒時擎) and cowritten by Oscar-winning director Sean Baker, won the Gan Foundation Award for Distribution at the Cannes Critics’ Week on Wednesday. The award, which includes a 20,000 euro (US$22,656) prize, is intended to support the French release of a first or second feature film by a new director. According to Critics’ Week, the prize would go to the film’s French distributor, Le Pacte. "A melodrama full of twists and turns, Left-Handed Girl retraces the daily life of a single mother and her two daughters in Taipei, combining the irresistible charm of
A Philippine official has denied allegations of mistreatment of crew members during Philippine authorities’ boarding of a Taiwanese fishing vessel on Monday. Philippine Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) spokesman Nazario Briguera on Friday said that BFAR law enforcement officers “observed the proper boarding protocols” when they boarded the Taiwanese vessel Sheng Yu Feng (昇漁豐號) and towed it to Basco Port in the Philippines. Briguera’s comments came a day after the Taiwanese captain of the Sheng Yu Feng, Chen Tsung-tun (陳宗頓), held a news conference in Pingtung County and accused the Philippine authorities of mistreatment during the boarding of
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is pushing for residents of Kinmen and Lienchiang counties to acquire Chinese ID cards in a bid to “blur national identities,” a source said. The efforts are part of China’s promotion of a “Kinmen-Xiamen twin-city living sphere, including a cross-strait integration pilot zone in China’s Fujian Province,” the source said. “The CCP is already treating residents of these outlying islands as Chinese citizens. It has also intensified its ‘united front’ efforts and infiltration of those islands,” the source said. “There is increasing evidence of espionage in Kinmen, particularly of Taiwanese military personnel being recruited by the
88.2 PERCENT INCREASE: The variants driving the current outbreak are not causing more severe symptoms, but are ‘more contagious’ than previous variants, an expert said Number of COVID-19 cases in the nation is surging, with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) describing the ongoing wave of infections as “rapid and intense,” and projecting that the outbreak would continue through the end of July. A total of 19,097 outpatient and emergency visits related to COVID-19 were reported from May 11 to Saturday last week, an 88.2 percent increase from the previous week’s 10,149 visits, CDC data showed. The nearly 90 percent surge in case numbers also marks the sixth consecutive weekly increase, although the total remains below the 23,778 recorded during the same period last year,
RSS