The Hakka Affairs Council (HAC) yesterday condemned China for pressuring a Mauritius hotel into canceling a cultural exchange event planned to take place there this week.
The event, a celebration of Hakka cuisine, was to be held from tomorrow until Wednesday next week at the Labourdonnais Waterfront Hotel in Port Louis, the capital, but the hotel on Saturday afternoon notified the council that it would cancel the event, citing pressure from the local Chinese embassy, HAC Deputy Minister Yang Chang-chen (楊長鎮) told a news conference in Taipei yesterday.
The embassy also threatened that any attempt by council Department of Culture and Education Director Fan Tso-ming (范佐銘) or others associated with the planned event to visit Mauritius would result in them being denied entry and might affect the ability of other Taiwanese to visit the country, he said.
Photo: Wu Hsin-tien, Taipei Times
The council is today holding the same event in South Africa, where activities began yesterday, after which it planned to take the event to Mauritius tomorrow, as 80 percent of ethnic Chinese residents there are of Hakka heritage.
The council invited celebrated Hakka chefs Jerry Chiu (邱寶郎), Wen Kuo-chi (溫國智) and Chiu Yu-han (邱聿涵) to teach hotel chefs how to prepare signature Hakka dishes. A musical performance by band ZiXuan & Slow Train (黃子軒樂團) was planned for Wednesday.
Planning for the event began after HAC Minister Lee Yong-te (李永得) in September last year received an invitation from a Hakka member of the government in Mauritius, where Taiwan has no representative office. An agreement to hold the event was officially signed last month.
The notice of the event’s cancelation received on Saturday stated that the Chinese embassy in Port Louis demanded the event be canceled because it “represented the Republic of China and not the People’s Republic of China,” adding that the hotel then agreed to cancel the event to “avoid any further foreign affairs disputes.”
Lee criticized China over the threat regarding denial of entry into Mauritius, saying the planned event was to be of a purely cultural nature.
The “Hakka Cuisine Touring Workshop” led by Jerry Chiu has already visited nine countries and 16 cities since it began touring last year, Yang said, adding that the workshop is scheduled to visit cities in South America and Europe in June and August, respectively.
The event in Port Louis was to be held at a private venue and was not political in nature, Yang said, adding that the pressure on the hotel from China showed that there are no limits to what the Chinese government would do.
The poster for the workshop displayed the official titles and emblems of the HAC and the Overseas Community Affairs Council, which is what the Chinese embassy took issue with, he said.
The council would continue to operate under its official name, despite pressure from China, and would “enter [events] through front doors and walk main streets,” he said, adding that its participation in international cultural exchanges would not change.
However, this does not mean it would go around “beating gongs and drums and wantonly announcing its official nature,” Yang said.
The council would engage in cultural exchanges in a reasonable manner that would not cause trouble for those it was engaging with, he added.
China’s insistence on the event’s cancellation is tantamount to meddling with Mauritius’ internal affairs and demonstrates a lack of courtesy toward the governments of Mauritius and Taiwan, he said.
Fan and other participants in the event said they would return to Taiwan following the conclusion of activities in South Africa.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), spokeswoman Yang Chih-yu (楊智伃) and Legislator Hsieh Lung-chieh (謝龍介) would be summoned by police for questioning for leading an illegal assembly on Thursday evening last week, Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) said today. The three KMT officials led an assembly outside the Taipei City Prosecutors’ Office, a restricted area where public assembly is not allowed, protesting the questioning of several KMT staff and searches of KMT headquarters and offices in a recall petition forgery case. Chu, Yang and Hsieh are all suspected of contravening the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) by holding
PRAISE: Japanese visitor Takashi Kubota said the Taiwanese temple architecture images showcased in the AI Art Gallery were the most impressive displays he saw Taiwan does not have an official pavilion at the World Expo in Osaka, Japan, because of its diplomatic predicament, but the government-backed Tech World pavilion is drawing interest with its unique recreations of works by Taiwanese artists. The pavilion features an artificial intelligence (AI)-based art gallery showcasing works of famous Taiwanese artists from the Japanese colonial period using innovative technologies. Among its main simulated displays are Eastern gouache paintings by Chen Chin (陳進), Lin Yu-shan (林玉山) and Kuo Hsueh-hu (郭雪湖), who were the three young Taiwanese painters selected for the East Asian Painting exhibition in 1927. Gouache is a water-based
Taiwan would welcome the return of Honduras as a diplomatic ally if its next president decides to make such a move, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. “Of course, we would welcome Honduras if they want to restore diplomatic ties with Taiwan after their elections,” Lin said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, when asked to comment on statements made by two of the three Honduran presidential candidates during the presidential campaign in the Central American country. Taiwan is paying close attention to the region as a whole in the wake of a
OFF-TARGET: More than 30,000 participants were expected to take part in the Games next month, but only 6,550 foreign and 19,400 Taiwanese athletes have registered Taipei city councilors yesterday blasted the organizers of next month’s World Masters Games over sudden timetable and venue changes, which they said have caused thousands of participants to back out of the international sporting event, among other organizational issues. They also cited visa delays and political interference by China as reasons many foreign athletes are requesting refunds for the event, to be held from May 17 to 30. Jointly organized by the Taipei and New Taipei City governments, the games have been rocked by numerous controversies since preparations began in 2020. Taipei City Councilor Lin Yen-feng (林延鳳) said yesterday that new measures by