About 50 foreign delegations are to attend the inauguration of president-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Monday next week, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said on Wednesday, including leaders of allied nations and a group of former officials from the US.
The number of visitors underscores the importance other countries pay to Taiwan’s democracy, Wu told reporters ahead of a legislative session in Taipei.
Visitors are to include representatives from the Vatican, Haiti and 10 other countries with which Taiwan has formal diplomatic relations, he said.
Photo: Sam Yeh, AFP
Eswatini is expected to send a 120-person delegation, the largest of all attendants, he added.
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves and Saint Kitts and Nevis Prime Minister Terrance Drew and their entourages are expected to land in Taiwan early this morning, the Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) reported.
Also expected to arrive today are Tuvaluan Prime Minister Feleti Teo, Belizean Prime Minister John Antonio Briceno, Saint Lucian Prime Minister Philip Joseph Pierre, Palauan President Surangel Whipps Jr and Marshall Islands President Hilda Heine and their entourages.
The Eswatini delegation’s landing time had not been confirmed as of press time last night.
Paraguayan President Santiago Pena and Guatemalan Minister of Foreign Affairs Carlos Ramiro Martinez are expected to arrive on Sunday.
Washington is sending an unofficial delegation, including two former government officials, the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) said in a statement late on Wednesday.
The delegation is to comprise former US deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage; Brian Deese, former assistant to the president and director of the National Economic Council (NEC); former AIT chair Richard Bush; AIT Chairwoman Laura Rosenberger; and AIT Director Sandra Oudkirk, it said.
Deese served as the 13th director of the NEC from 2021 to last year and as senior adviser to then-US president Barack Obama from 2015 to 2017.
Armitage was deputy secretary of state from 2001 to 2005 during the administration of then-US president George W. Bush.
The members are to attend Lai’s inauguration ceremony on Monday and meet with several leading figures in Taiwan, the AIT said.
“They will convey congratulations from the American people to Dr Lai Ching-te on his inauguration as Taiwan’s fifth democratically elected president, and to the Taiwan people for once again demonstrating the strength of their robust democratic system,” it said.
The delegation would also emphasize the US’ “longstanding commitment in maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait,” it added.
In Washington, a White House official on Wednesday said that for more than 20 years US delegations composed of former government officials have visited Taiwan after its presidential elections and attended the inauguration of the elected leaders.
The inauguration is “part of a normal routine democratic process,” the official told reporters on condition of anonymity to disclose details of the trip before they were formally announced.
Former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also has announced that he will attend President-elect Lai Ching-te’s (賴清德) presidential inauguration ceremony as a private individual, Voice of America reported yesterday.
Pompeo made the announcement while speaking at the Hudson Institute in Washington on Wednesday. In an interview with Radio Free Asia, Pompeo said he is pleased to have the opportunity to attend the inauguration ceremony and celebrate with the new leadership, adding that he is confident the new leadership will continue to work for the people of Taiwan, putting Taiwan first.
Meanwhile, a Canadian delegation has already arrived in Taiwan in a show of support for the nation’s democracy, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday.
Wu hosted a banquet for the 11-member delegation led by Canadian lawmaker Judy Sgro on Wednesday and thanked the Canadian parliament for “sparing no effort to support” Taiwan’s international participation, his ministry said.
“Sgro’s visit to Taiwan to attend the inauguration ceremony of our country’s president and vice president is a show of support and recognition for democratic Taiwan,” it said in a statement.
Sgro is the chairperson of Canada’s committee of international trade.
Additional reporting by Tony Yao and AFP
‘CHARM OFFENSIVE’: Beijing has been sending senior Chinese officials to Okinawa as part of efforts to influence public opinion against the US, the ‘Telegraph’ reported Beijing is believed to be sowing divisions in Japan’s Okinawa Prefecture to better facilitate an invasion of Taiwan, British newspaper the Telegraph reported on Saturday. Less than 750km from Taiwan, Okinawa hosts nearly 30,000 US troops who would likely “play a pivotal role should Beijing order the invasion of Taiwan,” it wrote. To prevent US intervention in an invasion, China is carrying out a “silent invasion” of Okinawa by stoking the flames of discontent among locals toward the US presence in the prefecture, it said. Beijing is also allegedly funding separatists in the region, including Chosuke Yara, the head of the Ryukyu Independence
UNITED: The premier said Trump’s tariff comments provided a great opportunity for the private and public sectors to come together to maintain the nation’s chip advantage The government is considering ways to assist the nation’s semiconductor industry or hosting collaborative projects with the private sector after US President Donald Trump threatened to impose a 100 percent tariff on chips exported to the US, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said yesterday. Trump on Monday told Republican members of the US Congress about plans to impose sweeping tariffs on semiconductors, steel, aluminum, copper and pharmaceuticals “in the very near future.” “It’s time for the United States to return to the system that made us richer and more powerful than ever before,” Trump said at the Republican Issues Conference in Miami, Florida. “They
GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY: Taiwan must capitalize on the shock waves DeepSeek has sent through US markets to show it is a tech partner of Washington, a researcher said China’s reported breakthrough in artificial intelligence (AI) would prompt the US to seek a stronger alliance with Taiwan and Japan to secure its technological superiority, a Taiwanese researcher said yesterday. The launch of low-cost AI model DeepSeek (深度求索) on Monday sent US tech stocks tumbling, with chipmaker Nvidia Corp losing 16 percent of its value and the NASDAQ falling 612.46 points, or 3.07 percent, to close at 19,341.84 points. On the same day, the Philadelphia Stock Exchange Semiconductor Sector index dropped 488.7 points, or 9.15 percent, to close at 4,853.24 points. The launch of the Chinese chatbot proves that a competitor can
‘VERY SHALLOW’: The center of Saturday’s quake in Tainan’s Dongshan District hit at a depth of 7.7km, while yesterday’s in Nansai was at a depth of 8.1km, the CWA said Two magnitude 5.7 earthquakes that struck on Saturday night and yesterday morning were aftershocks triggered by a magnitude 6.4 quake on Tuesday last week, a seismologist said, adding that the epicenters of the aftershocks are moving westward. Saturday and yesterday’s earthquakes occurred as people were preparing for the Lunar New Year holiday this week. As of 10am yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) recorded 110 aftershocks from last week’s main earthquake, including six magnitude 5 to 6 quakes and 32 magnitude 4 to 5 tremors. Seventy-one of the earthquakes were smaller than magnitude 4. Thirty-one of the aftershocks were felt nationwide, while 79
RSS