The nomination of Taiwan as a candidate for the US’ Visa Waiver Program (VWP) showed the US government has a high degree of confidence in President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tung Kuoyu (董國猷) said yesterday.
While the nomination came about mainly because Taiwan has met all the eligibility requirements for visa-free travel to the US, he added that “it was also undeniable that the progress was attributed to a high level of mutual trust between both governments.”
“No matter how much you have done, the result would not have happened without the existence of mutual trust,” Tung said at a press conference hosted by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus at the legislature.
Photo: CNA
The announcement that Taiwan has been nominated by the US Department of State as a VWP candidate, made three weeks ahead of the presidential election on Jan. 14, has sparked concerns that it could influence the KMT’s electoral outlook.
American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Acting Director Eric Madison on Thursday dismissed those concerns, saying the US judged visa waivers purely on the merits of statutory requirements rather than any other factors and that the announcement was made because Taiwan had recently fulfilled the requirements.
However, several KMT lawmakers yesterday touted the Ma administration’s achievements in winning the visa-free privilege that the US is considering and 124 countries and regions have extended to Taiwanese.
KMT Legislator Pan Wei-kang (潘維剛) said the number of countries and regions to which Taiwanese can travel without a visa remained at 54 under the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) during former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) eight-year tenure, while the number has increased to 124 under Ma.
“After the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the US has been especially cautious about entry into the country. That it would like to include Taiwan in its VWP suggests that Taiwan is a trustworthy country,” she said.
“The achievement has made our passports even more valuable and made Taiwanese more respected,” she said.
KMT Legislator Lin Yu-fang (林郁方) said the nomination was like a “cardiac stimulant needle the US injected Ma with” that gave Ma an advantage against DPP presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) in the election.
“The death of Kim Jong-il has brought about an unclear situation for North Korea. Under that situation, the US wished to see stability in Taiwan’s politics and in cross-strait relations,” Lin said.
The nomination showed that the US considers Ma to be more capable of maintaining cross-strait stability, Lin said.
Commenting on that interpretation of the VWP nomination, Edward Chen (陳一新), a professor at the Graduate Institute of the Americas at Tamkang University, said that the timing of the announcement “carried political connotations.”
“Although the US has said repeatedly that it has no preference among the two candidates, its policies have suggested otherwise. The US is still suspicious of Tsai, mainly because of her cross-strait policies,” Chen said.
The spate of visits by US high-level officials in the past three months, including US Assistant Secretary of Commerce Suresh Kumar, US Agency for International Development administrator Rajiv Shah and US Deputy Secretary of Energy Daniel Poneman, the recent statement made by US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton at the APEC summit and the VWP progress dispelled rumors that the US distrusted Ma owing to his conciliatory cross-strait policies, Chen said.
Joseph Wu (吳釗燮), a research fellow at the Institute of International Relations at National Chengchi University and the country’s former representative to the US in 2007 and 2008, disagreed, saying the US did not act inconsistently with its promise to maintain neutrality on Taiwan’s election.
“The AIT has said that the nomination has nothing to do with the election,” he said.
The efforts to push for the inclusion of Taiwan in the VWP stretch back to the end of 2007, with various rounds of talks held between high-ranking Taiwanese officials and their counterparts at the US Department of State, the US National Security Council and the US Department of Homeland Security before the DPP left office, Wu said.
Other than the talks, officials from both sides had inspected security and immigration facilities in the other side’s country and were close to completing negotiations on certain agreements needed to be signed to fulfill VWP requirements, he said.
Wu added that he had reservations about the comments made by Tung.
“In my view, the former DPP administration built a solid foundation,” Wu said.
“The nomination was actually a belated progress. Taiwan would have been nominated earlier if the KMT administration had worked harder,” he said.
ANTI-COERCION: EU Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager said the EU wishes to bolster relations with Taiwan within the framework of its ‘one China’ policy The EU is to further its engagement with Taiwan to defend democracy, freedom and an open market, while bolstering cooperation in semiconductor supply chains, EU Commissioner for Competition Margrethe Vestager said on Tuesday. In her remarks at a European Parliament plenary session focused on Taiwan-EU relations, Vestager referred to China’s increasing military presence in the Taiwan Strait, including flying missions off the southwest coast of Taiwan. “This display of force may have a direct impact on European security and prosperity,” she said, adding that the EU encourages all parties to avoid any unilateral actions that might increase tensions across the Strait. “We Europeans
DOWN, NOT OUT: The election was not a total defeat, as Chen still received 73,433 votes against the recall, and his party has ‘grown up’ through the process, he said Voters in Taichung yesterday recalled Taiwan Statebuilding Party Legislator Chen Po-wei (陳柏惟), making him the first legislator in the nation’s history to lose a recall election. A total of 77,899 votes were cast to recall Chen, while 73,433 voted against, the Taichung City Election Commission said, adding that 51.72 percent of the city’s second electoral district turned out. The Central Election Commission is to confirm the final figures within the next seven days, it said. Commission data showed that there are 294,976 eligible voters in the second district, comprised of Dadu (大肚), Shalu (沙鹿), Longjing (龍井), Wufong (霧峰) and Wurih (烏日) districts. Chen won
MILITARY RESOLVE: Washington does not want a cold war with Beijing, it just wants ‘China to understand that we’re not going to step back,’ Biden told a CNN town hall The US would come to Taiwan’s defense and has a commitment to defend the nation China claims as its own, US President Joe Biden said on Thursday, although the White House later said there was no change in policy toward Taiwan. “Yes, we have a commitment to do that,” Biden said at a CNN town hall meeting when asked if the US would come to the defense of Taiwan, which has been facing mounting military and political pressure from Beijing to accept Chinese sovereignty. While Washington is required by law to provide Taiwan with the means to defend itself, it has long
AFTERSHOCKS LIKELY: A hiker was hurt by falling rocks at the Taroko National Park, while a tower crane was damaged at a construction site in New Taipei City A series of earthquakes yesterday injured several people, damaged buildings and disrupted transportation. A magnitude 4.5 earthquake struck 8km northeast of Hualien County Hall at 12:38pm at a depth of 23.8km, the Central Weather Bureau’s Web site showed. It was followed at 1:11pm by a magnitude 6.5 quake centered near Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳) at a depth of 66.8km. A magnitude 5.4 earthquake followed less than a minute later, with its epicenter near the county’s Datong Township (大同), at a depth of 67.3km. A magnitude 4.2 quake again struck Nanao at 2:05pm at a depth of 63km. The magnitude 6.5 earthquake was the strongest
RSS