The top US commander in the Asia-Pacific region on Tuesday cast doubt on Taiwan’s chances of taking part in next year’s Rim of the Pacific Exercise (RIMPAC).
US Congress members last month formally asked US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel to invite Taiwan to RIMPAC, the biggest multinational maritime military exercises in the world.
However, when asked in a briefing at the Washington Foreign Press Center about the possibility of Taipei receiving an invitation to the exercises, US Admiral Samuel Locklear III did not respond affirmatively.
“Now to the question of Taiwan and RIMPAC, that’s a policy decision that would have to be made about whether or not that would occur,” he said. “And you know all the policy implications.”
Locklear has recently appeared positive about holding bilateral meetings between US and Chinese military leaders, and about Beijing agreeing to participate in the RIMPAC in May next year.
He has said that would represent a big commitment by Beijing because Chinese ships would operate alongside allied and partner navies under US command.
While Locklear did not explicitly say so, it is likely that Taiwan’s invitation to join the exercises would prompt a negative reaction from Beijing.
“Our primary role, our primary goal today is to ensure that the cross-strait stability continues … and is promoted,” Locklear said at the briefing
“We want to do the things that improve the opportunity for success and stability, rather than try to find things that might make it less stable,” he added.
“To the degree that we would throw an exercise like RIMPAC into that discussion, we’d have to have a long policy discussion about the implications and the pros and cons of doing that, not only between our relationship — the US’ relationship with Taiwan — but also about the stability of the region in general,” the admiral said. “That’s the dialogue we’ll have to have.”
Asked about what the next flashpoint in the Asia-Pacific region could be, Locklear said the area had been relatively peaceful for a long time.
“As a people and as a military, we should expect it to remain peaceful,” he said. “We should expect all parties to look for opportunities to de-escalate and maintain peace rather that create friction that would cause escalation.”
However, he said that a nuclear-capable North Korea was his No. 1 concern and posed “the most danger for the world at large.”
He said his next biggest concern was to make sure that the region worked through “all these territorial issues and that they don’t turn into a flash point.”
Locklear said the US should continue to ensure that national leaders and diplomats were able to conduct dialogues.
The goal is to create “space for dialogue,” and ensure the sufficient peace and prosperity required to allow negotiation processes to work, he said.
ENDEAVOR MANTA: The ship is programmed to automatically return to its designated home port and would self-destruct if seized by another party The Endeavor Manta, Taiwan’s first military-specification uncrewed surface vehicle (USV) tailor-made to operate in the Taiwan Strait in a bid to bolster the nation’s asymmetric combat capabilities made its first appearance at Kaohsiung’s Singda Harbor yesterday. Taking inspiration from Ukraine’s navy, which is using USVs to force Russia’s Black Sea fleet to take shelter within its own ports, CSBC Taiwan (台灣國際造船) established a research and development unit on USVs last year, CSBC chairman Huang Cheng-hung (黃正弘) said. With the exception of the satellite guidance system and the outboard motors — which were purchased from foreign companies that were not affiliated with Chinese-funded
PERMIT REVOKED: The influencer at a news conference said the National Immigration Agency was infringing on human rights and persecuting Chinese spouses Chinese influencer “Yaya in Taiwan” (亞亞在台灣) yesterday evening voluntarily left Taiwan, despite saying yesterday morning that she had “no intention” of leaving after her residence permit was revoked over her comments on Taiwan being “unified” with China by military force. The Ministry of the Interior yesterday had said that it could forcibly deport the influencer at midnight, but was considering taking a more flexible approach and beginning procedures this morning. The influencer, whose given name is Liu Zhenya (劉振亞), departed on a 8:45pm flight from Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) to Fuzhou, China. Liu held a news conference at the airport at 7pm,
Authorities yesterday elaborated on the rules governing Employment Gold Cards after a US cardholder was barred from entering Taiwan for six years after working without a permit during a 2023 visit. American YouTuber LeLe Farley was barred after already being approved for an Employment Gold Card, he said in a video published on his channel on Saturday. Farley, who has more than 420,000 subscribers on his YouTube channel, was approved for his Gold Card last month, but was told at a check-in counter at the Los Angeles International Airport that he could not enter Taiwan. That was because he previously participated in two
Taiwan was ranked the fourth-safest country in the world with a score of 82.9, trailing only Andorra, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in Numbeo’s Safety Index by Country report. Taiwan’s score improved by 0.1 points compared with last year’s mid-year report, which had Taiwan fourth with a score of 82.8. However, both scores were lower than in last year’s first review, when Taiwan scored 83.3, and are a long way from when Taiwan was named the second-safest country in the world in 2021, scoring 84.8. Taiwan ranked higher than Singapore in ninth with a score of 77.4 and Japan in 10th with
RSS