New Southbound Policy Office Director James Huang (黃志芳) has been named chairman of the nation’s main trade promotion body, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA), the Executive Yuan said yesterday.
Executive Yuan spokesperson Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇) said Premier Lin Chuan (林全) approved Huang’s appointment on Friday, but he did not give further details.
Huang, a former minister of foreign affaris, is to succeed Francis Liang (梁國新), who took over as Taiwan’s representative to Singapore last month.
The 58-year-old Huang went into business in 2008 after stepping down as minister when a new administration came in.
“You probably don’t know that I once was in business overseas,” Huang said on a previous occasion, adding that he worked hard to learn Vietnamese and that he had many ideas on how to promote trade.
In related news, the Executive Yuan on Friday said that the nation’s exports under the “new southbound policy” totaled US$5.37 billion last month, up 20 percent from the same month in 2015.
Among them, exports to Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos totaled US$4.72 billion, up 22.9 percent from December 2015.
The “new southbound policy,” introduced by President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), seeks to promote ties with the ASEAN nations, as well as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Australia and New Zealand.
However, talent exchanges increased at a much slower pace. Students from those nations studying in Taiwan totaled 29,145 last year, up only 2.1 percent from the 28,550 in the 2015 academic year.
Among them, the number of students from ASEAN totaled 27,264, up 1.9 percent year-on-year. One noteworthy change was that the number of students from South Asia was up 12.4 percent year-on-year, totaling 1,443.
Government agencies are to allocate more resources this year to boost the number of South Asian or Southeast Asian students coming to Taiwan, the office said.
Taiwan is stepping up plans to create self-sufficient supply chains for combat drones and increase foreign orders from the US to counter China’s numerical superiority, a defense official said on Saturday. Commenting on condition of anonymity, the official said the nation’s armed forces are in agreement with US Admiral Samuel Paparo’s assessment that Taiwan’s military must be prepared to turn the nation’s waters into a “hellscape” for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Paparo, the commander of the US Indo-Pacific Command, reiterated the concept during a Congressional hearing in Washington on Wednesday. He first coined the term in a security conference last
Prosecutors today declined to say who was questioned regarding alleged forgery on petitions to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators, after Chinese-language media earlier reported that members of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Youth League were brought in for questioning. The Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau confirmed that two people had been questioned, but did not disclose any further information about the ongoing investigation. KMT Youth League members Lee Hsiao-liang (李孝亮) and Liu Szu-yin (劉思吟) — who are leading the effort to recall DPP caucus chief executive Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) and Legislator Wu Pei-yi (吳沛憶) — both posted on Facebook saying: “I
Sung Chien-liang (宋建樑), who led efforts to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lee Kun-cheng (李坤城), was released on bail of NT$80,000 today amid outcry over his decision to wear a Nazi armband to questioning the night before. Sung arrived at the New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office for questioning in a recall petition forgery case last night wearing a red armband bearing a swastika, carrying a copy of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf and giving a Nazi salute. Sung left the building at 1:15am without the armband and covering the book with his coat. Lee said today that this is a serious
A court has approved Kaohsiung prosecutors’ request that two people working for Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lin Dai-hua (林岱樺) be detained, as a probe into two cases allegedly involving her continues. The request was made on Friday, after prosecutors raided Lin’s two offices and the staffers’ residences, and questioned five on suspicion of contravening the Anti-Corruption Act (貪汙治罪條例). The people included the directors of Lin’s Daliao (大寮) and Linyuan (林園) district offices in Kaohsiung, surnamed Chou (周) and Lin (林) respectively, as well as three other staffers. The prosecutors’ move came after they interrogated Lin Dai-hua on Wednesday. She appeared solemn following
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