Taiwan is cautiously optimistic about US President Donald Trump’s upcoming meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and hopes it will help promote peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday in the Solomon Islands.
Asked at a tea party for the media covering her visit to the Solomon Islands if Taiwan could be a bargaining chip during Trump’s five-nation trip to Asia, which begins today, Tsai said the government would keep a close eye on Trump’s visit to China.
“We maintain close communications with the US,” she added.
Photo: CNA
She said she hoped that Trump would reaffirm the US’ commitment to maintaining peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region during his trip.
The Solomon Islands were Tsai’s final stop on her three-nation tour to Pacific Ocean allies and she is scheduled to transit through the US territory of Guam tomorrow on her way home.
Minister of Foreign Affairs David Lee (李大維) said that Tsai’s stopover in Guam was the outcome of consultations with the US.
Lee was responding to a report in the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) that Tsai had originally planned to transit through Hawaii on both her outbound and homeward flights, but as Trump is stopping in Hawaii for a layover en route to Asia, Washington arranged for her to transit in Guam to avoid complicating relations between Washington, Beijing and Taipei before the Trump-Xi summit.
It is standard practice for stopovers to and from travel destinations to be different, Lee added.
Tsai also told reporters at the tea party that she hopes Taiwan can find its own place in the international community through its contributions to education, healthcare and agriculture.
Education, healthcare, and agriculture were the key targets of cooperative agreements Taiwan signed with the Marshall Islands, Tuvalu and the Solomon Islands during her trip, she said.
Given that these are the foundation for the UN’s 17 sustainable development goals, Tsai said she is confident Taiwan can make a place for itself in the international community through its collaborations in these areas.
Each of the three nations has committed itself to the UN sustainable development goals and Taiwan would continue to help them achieve those goals, she said.
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