With the legislative polls just two weeks away, observers from overseas have begun to arrive in Taiwan to watch the elections, take part in related campaigns or discuss post-election party realignment, sources said yesterday.
Two groups of former officials, scholars and writers from Japan -- which will account for around 100 election-related visitors -- will arrive this week to observe the elections and to assist the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) in its election drive, sources said.
Some of the most prominent of those arriving will be Nakajima Mineo, president of the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Arima Genji, a former Japanese minister of state for defense in the 1970s, renowned Japanese cartoonist Kobayashi Yoshinori, as well as Japanese writer Kamisaka Fuyuko.
One of the groups, called the "TSU Campaign Troupe Saluting Lee Teng-hui (李登輝)," will hold a press conference tomorrow to voice its support for former president Lee as well as the TSU, sources at the TSU said.
Another major group of scholars will take part in a one-day seminar on post-election Taiwan on Dec. 2, a symposium jointly held by the Government Information Office and National Chengchi University, the conference's secretary-general, Joseph Wu (吳釗燮), told the Taipei Times.
The seminar will focus on three themes: the significance of Taiwan's elections and democratic consolidation, comparative analysis of democratic elections, and Taiwan's democracy, peace and security in East Asia, according to the symposium's tentative schedule.
Overseas participants include Thomas Gold, a sociologist at University of California, Berkeley, Andrew Nathan, a China specialist at Columbia University, Bonnie Glaser, a consultant on Asian affairs with the Pacific Forum CSIS, and Michael Yahuda, a political scientist from the London School of Economics and Political Science, among others.
Premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) is scheduled to give a keynote speech during the luncheon called: "Democracy and democratic consolidation: a comparative experience."
Stanley Kao (高碩泰), director general of the department of North American Affairs of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said members of the US Republican National Council and members of Progressive Policy Institute, a US Democratic Party think tank, are scheduled to visit Taiwan after the Dec. 1 elections.
In addition, four scholars from the Asian-African College of Moscow University arrived in Taiwan on Monday to attend an academic symposium organized by Tamkang University as well as to take advantage of the opportunity to observe the elections, sources said.
The Russian delegation included M. Meyer and A. Karneev, dean and deputy dean of the college.
‘DANGEROUS GAME’: Legislative Yuan budget cuts have already become a point of discussion for Democrats and Republicans in Washington, Elbridge Colby said Taiwan’s fall to China “would be a disaster for American interests” and Taipei must raise defense spending to deter Beijing, US President Donald Trump’s pick to lead Pentagon policy, Elbridge Colby, said on Tuesday during his US Senate confirmation hearing. The nominee for US undersecretary of defense for policy told the Armed Services Committee that Washington needs to motivate Taiwan to avoid a conflict with China and that he is “profoundly disturbed” about its perceived reluctance to raise defense spending closer to 10 percent of GDP. Colby, a China hawk who also served in the Pentagon in Trump’s first team,
SEPARATE: The MAC rebutted Beijing’s claim that Taiwan is China’s province, asserting that UN Resolution 2758 neither mentions Taiwan nor grants the PRC authority over it The “status quo” of democratic Taiwan and autocratic China not belonging to each other has long been recognized by the international community, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday in its rebuttal of Beijing’s claim that Taiwan can only be represented in the UN as “Taiwan, Province of China.” Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) yesterday at a news conference of the third session at the 14th National People’s Congress said that Taiwan can only be referred to as “Taiwan, Province of China” at the UN. Taiwan is an inseparable part of Chinese territory, which is not only history but
CROSSED A LINE: While entertainers working in China have made pro-China statements before, this time it seriously affected the nation’s security and interests, a source said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) late on Saturday night condemned the comments of Taiwanese entertainers who reposted Chinese statements denigrating Taiwan’s sovereignty. The nation’s cross-strait affairs authority issued the statement after several Taiwanese entertainers, including Patty Hou (侯佩岑), Ouyang Nana (歐陽娜娜) and Michelle Chen (陳妍希), on Friday and Saturday shared on their respective Sina Weibo (微博) accounts a post by state broadcaster China Central Television. The post showed an image of a map of Taiwan along with the five stars of the Chinese flag, and the message: “Taiwan is never a country. It never was and never will be.” The post followed remarks
INVESTMENT WATCH: The US activity would not affect the firm’s investment in Taiwan, where 11 production lines would likely be completed this year, C.C. Wei said Investments by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) in the US should not be a cause for concern, but rather seen as the moment that the company and Taiwan stepped into the global spotlight, President William Lai (賴清德) told a news conference at the Presidential Office in Taipei yesterday alongside TSMC chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家). Wei and US President Donald Trump in Washington on Monday announced plans to invest US$100 billion in the US to build three advanced foundries, two packaging plants, and a research and development center, after Trump threatened to slap tariffs on chips made
RSS