Whether Taiwan would be invited to attend this year’s World Health Assembly (WHA) depends on a power play within the WHO, despite open support from like-minded countries, Taiwanese observers have said.
The WHA, the decisionmaking body of the WHO, is to hold its 73rd session from May 17 to 21 in Geneva, Switzerland, although the meeting might be conducted virtually due to travel restrictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
US-based magazine Foreign Policy reported that Washington is seeking the support of key allies to help restore Taiwan’s observer status at the WHA and to cosign a letter asking WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus to invite Taiwan to the assembly.
Photo: AP
The WHO Secretariat has the discretion to invite any non-WHO member to the WHA without calling a meeting to vote on the matter.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Lo Chih-cheng (羅致政) on Saturday said that the key for Taiwan’s bid to attend the WHA rests on the internal politics of the WHO, despite growing international support for the nation.
“Taiwan will have a better chance of being invited to the WHA if the US increases its maneuvering in the WHO Secretariat,” he said.
Prospect Foundation president Lai I-chung (賴怡忠) said that Tedros is extremely unlikely to invite Taiwan to the WHA, after the Ethiopian microbiologist on April 8 accused the nation of organizing personal and racist attacks against him.
However, the US might want to break the unspoken rule that Taiwan’s participation requires China’s approval, he added.
Lee Che-chuan (李哲全), a senior researcher at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said it is difficult for Taiwan to be accepted into the WHO due to “one China” policies observed by many nations, but added that there is a chance that it could be invited to the WHA.
The Republic of China was a founding member of the WHO. However, the nation was expelled in 1972, a few months after its seat at the UN was taken over by the People’s Republic of China.
Since then, Taipei has been unable to participate in the WHA, apart from the observer status it held from 2009 to 2016, when relations with Beijing were relatively warm under the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government.
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