Somaliland would officially open a representative office in Taipei early next month, the self-declared east African state’s first representative to Taiwan, Mohamed Omar Hagi Mohamoud, said yesterday.
Preparations are still under way to set up the representative office, but it is expected to start operations on Sept. 9, Mohamoud said.
Working with the representative would be four employees, two who arrived from Somaliland with Mohamoud and two Taiwanese, who have yet to be recruited, he added.
Photo: EPA-EFE
The representative revealed the plan on the sidelines of a seminar held by the Taipei-based Chinese International Economic Cooperation Association on allowing Africa-based Taiwanese businesspeople and African students studying in Taiwan to share their views on exploring trade opportunities on the continent.
It was the first event that Mohamoud has attended since he completed a 14-day quarantine after arriving in Taiwan on Aug. 7.
Mohamoud described relations between Somaliland and Taiwan as “formal,” saying that the proof is February’s agreement signed by their foreign ministers that each would establish a representative office in the other’s country.
High-ranking officials from the two nations participated in a ceremony on Monday last week to mark Taiwan’s opening of its representative office in the Somaliland capital, Hargeisa.
The agreement, designed to pave the way toward greater cooperation, has attracted the ire of China, which considers Taiwan as its territory, and Somalia, which has a similar view of Somaliland.
However, despite Chinese influence and pressure, Mohamoud said that Somaliland’s relationship with Taiwan would remain unaffected.
Somaliland is an independent, sovereign country, Mohamoud said, adding that other countries cannot dictate “with whom we are going to develop relations.”
Somaliland declared independence from Somalia in 1991 after a civil war.
Somaliland has set up 22 representative offices, including in Belgium, Canada, France, Switzerland and the US, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said.
WAITING GAME: The US has so far only offered a ‘best rate tariff,’ which officials assume is about 15 percent, the same as Japan, a person familiar with the matter said Taiwan and the US have completed “technical consultations” regarding tariffs and a finalized rate is expected to be released soon, Executive Yuan spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) told a news conference yesterday, as a 90-day pause on US President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs is set to expire today. The two countries have reached a “certain degree of consensus” on issues such as tariffs, nontariff trade barriers, trade facilitation, supply chain resilience and economic security, Lee said. They also discussed opportunities for cooperation, investment and procurement, she said. A joint statement is still being negotiated and would be released once the US government has made
NEW GEAR: On top of the new Tien Kung IV air defense missiles, the military is expected to place orders for a new combat vehicle next year for delivery in 2028 Mass production of Tien Kung IV (Sky Bow IV) missiles is expected to start next year, with plans to order 122 pods, the Ministry of National Defense’s (MND) latest list of regulated military material showed. The document said that the armed forces would obtain 46 pods of the air defense missiles next year and 76 pods the year after that. The Tien Kung IV is designed to intercept cruise missiles and ballistic missiles to an altitude of 70km, compared with the 60km maximum altitude achieved by the Missile Segment Enhancement variant of PAC-3 systems. A defense source said yesterday that the number of
‘CRUDE’: The potential countermeasure is in response to South Africa renaming Taiwan’s representative offices and the insistence that it move out of Pretoria Taiwan is considering banning exports of semiconductors to South Africa after the latter unilaterally downgraded and changed the names of Taiwan’s two representative offices, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. On Monday last week, the South African Department of International Relations and Cooperation unilaterally released a statement saying that, as of April 1, the Taipei Liaison Offices in Pretoria and Cape Town had been renamed the “Taipei Commercial Office in Johannesburg” and the “Taipei Commercial Office in Cape Town.” Citing UN General Assembly Resolution 2758, it said that South Africa “recognizes the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole
Taiwanese exports to the US are to be subject to a 20 percent tariff starting on Thursday next week, according to an executive order signed by US President Donald Trump yesterday. The 20 percent levy was the same as the tariffs imposed on Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh by Trump. It was higher than the tariffs imposed on Japan, South Korea and the EU (15 percent), as well as those on the Philippines (19 percent). A Taiwan official with knowledge of the matter said it is a "phased" tariff rate, and negotiations would continue. "Once negotiations conclude, Taiwan will obtain a better
RSS