Former US deputy assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific affairs Randall Schriver met with senior Taiwanese politicians yesterday, with the stymied special arms procurement budget at the top of his agenda.
Schriver went to Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) headquarters yesterday and met with party Chairman Lien Chan (
The Liberty Times is the sister newspaper of the Taipei Times.
Schriver also met with Premier Frank Hsieh (
Schriver's key focus in his discussions was the NT$410.8 billion (US$12.8 billion) arms budget to procure eight diesel-electric submarines, 12 P-3C Orion maritime patrol aircraft and three PAC-3 Patriot anti-missile batteries, according to the reports.
The budget has been consistently blocked in the legislature by the pan-blue camp, which has argued that the arms package is unnecessary and too expensive.
The pan-green camp has argued that the weapons systems are necessary to bolster the nation's defenses, in light of the rapid modernization of the Chinese military and Beijing's bellicose attitude toward Taiwan.
Although he has left government service and now works for Armitage Associates -- a consulting firm run by former US deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage -- Schriver will be meeting with virtually all of the nation's top officials during his three-day visit. He is expected to hold meetings with President Chen Shui-bian (
In addition to his tenure at the Department of State, Schriver also served in the Pentagon as the senior director for China, Taiwan, Mongolia and Hong Kong during the Clinton administration.
During his postings in both Democratic and Republican administrations, Schriver made a name for himself as an outspoken advocate of democracy and strong supporter of Taiwan.
"Randy [Schriver] had a widespread reputation for being one of the strongest supporters of Taiwan's democracy in the Bush administration," a US government insider told the Taipei Times yesterday.
Although Schriver understands the importance of US-China relations, "he would never support anything to give up Taiwan or its democratic achievements" in order to placate Beijing, the source said.
Because of his views on the importance of democratic development in East Asia, the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy invited Schriver to deliver a speech yesterday evening on "Taiwan and global democratization."
The speech was delivered at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' training center on Taipei's Dunhua South Road.
In a meeting yesterday with Mainland Affairs Council Chairman Joseph Wu (
"The rise of China has caused negative feelings in political circles in the US," Schriver told Wu, according to the MAC.
"What China has done recently, including increasing its deployment of missiles aimed at Taiwan and enacting the `Anti-Secession' Law, has decreased the degree of mutual confidence in the cross-strait relationship," Schriver told Wu.
Schriver and Wu agreed that the best way to deal with China's rise is to facilitate its peaceful democratization, the MAC said.
Schriver is scheduled to meet with the president today, and is expected to be awarded one of the national orders, such as the Order of the Propitious Clouds, the Presidential Office said in a statement released yesterday. additional reporting by Shih hsiu-chuan
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) and Chunghwa Telecom yesterday confirmed that an international undersea cable near Keelung Harbor had been cut by a Chinese ship, the Shunxin-39, a freighter registered in Cameroon. Chunghwa Telecom said the cable had its own backup equipment, and the incident would not affect telecommunications within Taiwan. The CGA said it dispatched a ship under its first fleet after receiving word of the incident and located the Shunxin-39 7 nautical miles (13km) north of Yehliu (野柳) at about 4:40pm on Friday. The CGA demanded that the Shunxin-39 return to seas closer to Keelung Harbor for investigation over the
National Kaohsiung University of Science and Technology (NKUST) yesterday promised it would increase oversight of use of Chinese in course materials, following a social media outcry over instances of simplified Chinese characters being used, including in a final exam. People on Threads wrote that simplified Chinese characters were used on a final exam and in a textbook for a translation course at the university, while the business card of a professor bore the words: “Taiwan Province, China.” Photographs of the exam, the textbook and the business card were posted with the comments. NKUST said that other members of the faculty did not see
The Taipei City Government yesterday said contractors organizing its New Year’s Eve celebrations would be held responsible after a jumbo screen played a Beijing-ran television channel near the event’s end. An image showing China Central Television (CCTV) Channel 3 being displayed was posted on the social media platform Threads, sparking an outcry on the Internet over Beijing’s alleged political infiltration of the municipal government. A Taipei Department of Information and Tourism spokesman said event workers had made a “grave mistake” and that the Television Broadcasts Satellite (TVBS) group had the contract to operate the screens. The city would apply contractual penalties on TVBS
An apartment building in New Taipei City’s Sanchong District (三重) collapsed last night after a nearby construction project earlier in the day allegedly caused it to tilt. Shortly after work began at 9am on an ongoing excavation of a construction site on Liuzhang Street (六張街), two neighboring apartment buildings tilted and cracked, leading to exterior tiles peeling off, city officials said. The fire department then dispatched personnel to help evacuate 22 residents from nine households. After the incident, the city government first filled the building at No. 190, which appeared to be more badly affected, with water to stabilize the
RSS