The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday announced that it has decided to close the nation's representative office in Belarus, citing the former communist country's opposition to Taiwan's bids to participate in international bodies such as the UN and the World Health Organization (WHO).
MOFA Spokesman Michel Lu (呂慶龍) said yesterday that the Taipei Economic and Trade Mission in Minsk, Taiwan's de facto embassy in Belarus, will be closed with immediate effect, due to its political and economic ineffectiveness.
The function of the Belarus representative office will be taken over by the Russian representative office in Moscow.
One of the main reasons for the closure of the mission, Lu said, was Belarus' opposition to Taiwan's bids to join the UN and WHO.
"When Taiwan establishes a representative office in a non-allied country, we hope this country will not oppose Taiwan's international participation, even if it cannot openly voice support for the nation's entry to the UN and WHO," Lu said. "Belarus did not avoid the issue. It went along with China in openly opposing Taiwan's bids to join the UN and WHO. This is one of the most important reasons why we shut down the mission office there," he said.
Taiwan and Belarus reached a mutual agreement in 1996 to establish economic and trade offices in each other's territoties. Taiwan went ahead and opened its economic and trade office in Minsk. However, Belarus has not opened an office in Taiwan.
Lu said yesterday that the annual bilateral trade volume between Taiwan and Belarus ranged between US$20 million and US$30 million, which was an insignificant amount to Taiwan's economy.
"Improvement on mutual relations was limited. That's why we decided to close down the representative office," the spokesman said.
Lu said that the ministry evaluates the performance of all of its representative offices in non-allied countries.
In addition to mutual economic, trade and personnel exchanges, these countries' stance on Taiwan's international participation is a major consideration in gauging whether it is necessary to maintain the operation of the mission.
The Coast Guard Administration (CGA) and Chunghwa Telecom yesterday confirmed that an international undersea cable near Keelung Harbor had been cut by a Chinese ship, the Shunxin-39, a freighter registered in Cameroon. Chunghwa Telecom said the cable had its own backup equipment, and the incident would not affect telecommunications within Taiwan. The CGA said it dispatched a ship under its first fleet after receiving word of the incident and located the Shunxin-39 7 nautical miles (13km) north of Yehliu (野柳) at about 4:40pm on Friday. The CGA demanded that the Shunxin-39 return to seas closer to Keelung Harbor for investigation over the
National Kaohsiung University of Science and Technology (NKUST) yesterday promised it would increase oversight of use of Chinese in course materials, following a social media outcry over instances of simplified Chinese characters being used, including in a final exam. People on Threads wrote that simplified Chinese characters were used on a final exam and in a textbook for a translation course at the university, while the business card of a professor bore the words: “Taiwan Province, China.” Photographs of the exam, the textbook and the business card were posted with the comments. NKUST said that other members of the faculty did not see
The Taipei City Government yesterday said contractors organizing its New Year’s Eve celebrations would be held responsible after a jumbo screen played a Beijing-ran television channel near the event’s end. An image showing China Central Television (CCTV) Channel 3 being displayed was posted on the social media platform Threads, sparking an outcry on the Internet over Beijing’s alleged political infiltration of the municipal government. A Taipei Department of Information and Tourism spokesman said event workers had made a “grave mistake” and that the Television Broadcasts Satellite (TVBS) group had the contract to operate the screens. The city would apply contractual penalties on TVBS
An apartment building in New Taipei City’s Sanchong District (三重) collapsed last night after a nearby construction project earlier in the day allegedly caused it to tilt. Shortly after work began at 9am on an ongoing excavation of a construction site on Liuzhang Street (六張街), two neighboring apartment buildings tilted and cracked, leading to exterior tiles peeling off, city officials said. The fire department then dispatched personnel to help evacuate 22 residents from nine households. After the incident, the city government first filled the building at No. 190, which appeared to be more badly affected, with water to stabilize the
RSS