Senior US defense and diplomatic officials will not attend this year’s Taiwan-US Defense Industry Conference, organizers said on Sunday, an unexpected absence that has given rise to speculation about the reason why, ranging from a dispute over aggressive efforts to secure the sale of F-16 aircraft to Taiwan’s role in the Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) dispute.
The annual event, organized by the US-Taiwan Business Council, is a forum to address future US defense cooperation with Taiwan as well as Taiwan’s defense and national security needs and arms procurement plans.
Deputy Minister of National Defense Andrew Yang (楊念祖) is heading the Taiwanese delegation at this year’s conference, which opened on Sunday in Hershey, Pennsylvania.
US-Taiwan Business Council chairman Paul Wolfowitz is hosting the conference, which ends today.
In the past, the US has sent assistant secretary-level officials from the US Departments of State and Defense to attend the conference and deliver keynote speeches.
US-Taiwan Business Council president Rupert Hammond-Chambers said on Sunday that US Assistant Secretary of Defense for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs Mark Lippert had originally planned to attend the annual meeting.
However, the council was informed on Friday that Lippert could not attend because of “scheduling issues,” Hammond-Chambers said, adding that the council also received a similar notice from the State Department the same day.
Sources say the information was also relayed to the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office (TECRO).
The council said it had not received confirmation from Department of State Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell on whether he would attend.
When the conference opened on Sunday, the absence of both officials was noticed, given that since 2002 the deputy secretaries of the Department of State and the Department of Defense usually represented the US government at the conference.
They were the ones who explained US policy to the representatives, academics and members from the national defense industry from both the US and Taiwan, the council said.
It also marked the first time since 2002 that a senior official from the State Department did not attend the conference.
According to the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper), the absence of US senior officials was the result of Washington’s displeasure with the President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) administration’s policy on the Diaoyutais.
However, Ministry of Foreign Affairs officials said the absence had nothing to do with Taiwan’s recent handling of its territorial dispute with Japan.
Sources said the State Department would explain why it chose not send a senior official to attend the conference when the time was right.
Meanwhile, TECRO attributed the senior officials’ absence to a campaign by the US-Taiwan Business Council to persuade US Senators and representatives to support sales of F-16C/D aircraft to Taiwan, which Taipei has requested on several occasions since 2006.
The council asked members of Congress and the Senate to write a letter to US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on the matter, with US Senator John Cornyn pressuring US President Barack Obama’s administration to make a clear stance on the sale of F-16C/Ds by holding up the nomination of Lippert for the job of US assistant secretary for Asian and Pacific security affairs.
Though the Obama administration finally announced its stance on the arms sale at last year’s Taiwan Defense Industry Conference — stating that it would not sell the F-16C/D, but would offer an upgrade package for Taiwan’s existing fleet of F-16A/Bs — Cornyn and others have not ceased pressuring the Obama administration on the issue.
The overtly active pressure may have annoyed the administrative department, TECRO officials said, adding that whether the absence of senior US officials at this year’s conference would lead to the discontinuation of the 10 year-old conference remained to be seen.
The US has never expressed dissatisfaction with Taipei’s policy regarding the Diaoyutai Islands, the TECRO officials said, adding that senior US officials were still willing to meet Yang in Washington after he attended the conference.
US-Taiwan relations have not changed, they said, adding that the incident nevertheless highlighted the conflicting views of the Ma administration and the business council on the F-16C/D issue.
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
‘MALIGN PURPOSE’: Governments around the world conduct espionage operations, but China’s is different, as its ultimate goal is annexation, a think tank head said Taiwan is facing a growing existential threat from its own people spying for China, experts said, as the government seeks to toughen measures to stop Beijing’s infiltration efforts and deter Taiwanese turncoats. While Beijing and Taipei have been spying on each other for years, experts said that espionage posed a bigger threat to Taiwan due to the risk of a Chinese attack. Taiwan’s intelligence agency said China used “diverse channels and tactics” to infiltrate the nation’s military, government agencies and pro-China organizations. The main targets were retired and active members of the military, persuaded by money, blackmail or pro-China ideology to steal
RSS