The Bush administration has proposed allocating almost US$67 million next year for the construction of a new headquarters for the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) in Neihu, Taipei.
The money is part of the administration's US budget request submitted to Congress for the Fiscal Year 2009. The budget, which will fund the cost of operating the US government for the year beginning on Oct. 1, was unveiled on Monday.
Groundbreaking for the new facility is scheduled to begin this year, the US State Department said in documents accompanying the White House budget submission.
Taiwan and the US signed a 99-year lease agreement on the 2.6 hectare site off Jinhu Road in December 2004.
When added to money previously raised, the funds will provide a total US$171.6 million for the new office complex, the department said. After the lease was signed, the cost estimate for the complex was US$160 million.
The money will come from the State Department's Strategic Capital program, which covers projects needed for "strategic, policy or political considerations," it said.
Also, mirroring persistent complaints by AIT staff about the condition of the dilapidated AIT building on Xinyi Road, the money for the new complex is part of a program "designed to meet the demands of a critical gap in the overseas real property portfolio," the department said.
In the new budget, the Bush administration also proposed an increase of nearly 4 percent in AIT's budget for next year, the second consecutive annual increase.
The administration proposed to spend US$16.84 million next year to operate the institute, which acts as the intermediary between the US governments and Taiwan under the Taiwan Relations Act.
That compares with this year's AIT budget of US$16.22 million.
While AIT personnel act in many ways as US officials, the organization is technically an independent contractor to the State Department and the budget amounts represent payments by the department to the institute as a private company.
In addition to this money, AIT expects to collect US$32 million from other sources, the State Department said.
This will include US$18 million in visa processing fees and US$14 million in reimbursements from other agency contracts and the department's Chinese Language School.
Fees from other agencies include those from the US departments of commerce, agriculture, defense, energy and homeland security.
The current and proposed appropriations are still well below the US$19.75 million the administration made available to AIT for fiscal 2006, before it slashed the agency's budget by nearly 20 percent to US$15.83 million.
While the exact budget for next year will be determined by the US Congress, lawmakers in the past have traditionally voted the amount requested by the administration, although they did make a small cut to the administration's request this year.
‘LAGGING BEHIND’: The NATO secretary-general called on democratic allies to be ‘clear-eyed’ about Beijing’s military buildup, urging them to boost military spending NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte mentioning China’s bullying of Taiwan and its ambition to reshape the global order has significance during a time when authoritarian states are continuously increasing their aggression, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. In a speech at the Carnegie Europe think tank in Brussels on Thursday, Rutte said Beijing is bullying Taiwan and would start to “nibble” at Taiwan if Russia benefits from a post-invasion peace deal with Ukraine. He called on democratic allies to boost defense investments and also urged NATO members to increase defense spending in the face of growing military threats from Russia
LEAP FORWARD: The new tanks are ‘decades more advanced than’ the army’s current fleet and would enable it to compete with China’s tanks, a source said A shipment of 38 US-made M1A2T Abrams tanks — part of a military procurement package from the US — arrived at the Port of Taipei early yesterday. The vehicles are the first batch of 108 tanks and other items that then-US president Donald Trump announced for Taiwan in 2019. The Ministry of National Defense at the time allocated NT$40.5 billion (US$1.25 billion) for the purchase. To accommodate the arrival of the tanks, the port suspended the use of all terminals and storage area machinery from 6pm last night until 7am this morning. The tanks are expected to be deployed at the army’s training
PEACEFUL RESOLUTION: A statement issued following a meeting between Australia and Britain reiterated support for Taiwan and opposition to change in the Taiwan Strait Canada should support the peaceful resolution of Taiwan’s destiny according to the will of Taiwanese, Canadian lawmakers said in a resolution marking the second anniversary of that nation’s Indo-Pacific strategy on Monday. The Canadian House of Commons committee on Canada-Chinese relations made the comment as part of 34 recommendations for the new edition of the strategy, adding that Ottawa should back Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations. Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, first published in October 2022, emphasized that the region’s security, trade, human rights, democracy and environmental protection would play a crucial role in shaping Canada’s future. The strategy called for Canada to deepen
TECH CONFERENCE: Input from industry and academic experts can contribute to future policymaking across government agencies, President William Lai said Multifunctional service robots could be the next new area in which Taiwan could play a significant role, given its strengths in chip manufacturing and software design, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman and chief executive C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said yesterday. “In the past two months, our customers shared a lot of their future plans with me. Artificial intelligence [AI] and AI applications were the most talked about subjects in our conversation,” Wei said in a speech at the National Science and Technology Conference in Taipei. TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, counts Nvidia Corp, Advanced Micro Devices Inc, Apple Inc and
RSS