The Chinese embassy in Ukraine attempted to thwart the Ukrainian parliament’s plan to establish a pro-Taiwan group, Newsweek magazine reported on Saturday.
Ukraine’s parliament on Aug. 17 launched the Taiwan Friendship Group, which is led by Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Oleksandr Merezhko and consists of 15 lawmakers, two-thirds of whom belong to the ruling party.
Newsweek reported that “a diplomatic dispute is brewing between Ukraine and China” as Beijing lodged a protest against the newly established group at the Ukrainian embassy in China last week.
Photo: Reuters
Merezhko was quoted as saying that China is “trying to dictate what a foreign parliament should do,” adding that he turned down a request to meet with Chinese Ambassador to Ukraine Fan Xianrong (范先榮) prior to the initiation of the group.
He said that Fan refused to meet with him and his colleagues in March when they tried to solicit China’s support for humanitarian corridors amid Russia’s invasion of the nation, the magazine reported.
China’s indifference to Ukraine motivated the parliament to set up the group, he added.
After the group was launched, Fan complained to several senior members of the Servant of the People ruling party, but nobody put pressure on members of the group, Merezhko said.
Fan might be worried that Ukraine would send a delegation to Taiwan following the lead of US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi earlier this month, he said.
Ukrainian lawmaker Inna Sovsun, another member of the group and a long-term supporter of Taiwan, said that “China is worried Ukraine’s defense against Russia could become a model for Taiwanese resistance against China,” the magazine reported.
The biggest concern for Beijing is the similarity between Ukraine and Taiwan, as they are “two smaller countries fighting against colonialism,” she was quoted as saying.
She said that group members “coordinated the creation of the group through different layers of government” so as not to cause trouble for the executive.
The executive departments of foreign governments are likely to be constrained by diplomatic ties with Beijing or the “one China” policy, while legislative departments have more freedom to act, Newsweek said.
Analysts say that the Ukrainian government is hesitant to support Taiwan publicly because it does not want to see China taking Russia’s side in the war.
“I do not see the potential of the Chinese helping Ukraine. What we want from them is not to help Russia,” Sovsun was quoted by Newsweek as saying.
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
NO WORK, CLASS: President William Lai urged people in the eastern, southern and northern parts of the country to be on alert, with Typhoon Kong-rey approaching Typhoon Kong-rey is expected to make landfall on Taiwan’s east coast today, with work and classes canceled nationwide. Packing gusts of nearly 300kph, the storm yesterday intensified into a typhoon and was expected to gain even more strength before hitting Taitung County, the US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center said. The storm is forecast to cross Taiwan’s south, enter the Taiwan Strait and head toward China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The CWA labeled the storm a “strong typhoon,” the most powerful on its scale. Up to 1.2m of rainfall was expected in mountainous areas of eastern Taiwan and destructive winds are likely
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most
RSS