The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday extended its appreciation to Brazilian Deputy Paulo Eduardo Martins, who disclosed a letter from the Chinese embassy in Sao Paulo to local lawmakers demanding that they not congratulate President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on her inauguration on Wednesday last week.
In a tweet on Monday, Martins posted a photograph of the letter, which stated that the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of the Brazilian Congress, should respect its “one China” principle by not delivering any congratulatory remarks to Tsai’s second-term inauguration.
The disclosure sparked a series of posts on Twitter from Brazilians with the hashtag #VivaTaiwan, which means “long live Taiwan” in Portuguese, to show their backing for Taiwan and express concern over Beijing’s influence.
Photo: Lu Yi-hsuan, Taipei Times
It was one of the top three trending hashtags on Twitter on the day following Martin’s post.
Tsai on Tuesday used the hashtag to express her gratitude to Brazilian supporters of Taiwan.
“Thank you to all of our friends in #Brazil for your kind congratulations, and I hope you are all staying safe & healthy. #VivaTaiwan #VivaBrazil,” she tweeted.
Asked for comment during a news briefing in Taipei yesterday, ministry spokesperson Joanne Ou (歐江安) expressed her gratitude for Martins’ safeguarding of democratic values, as well as for his congratulatory remarks, adding that the ministry also thanks the Brazilian public for their support for Taiwan.
Freedom of speech is a fundamental human right, and democracy is a mutual value shared by Taiwan and Brazil, she said.
As of yesterday, 275 dignitaries from 49 nations and international organizations, including presidents, prime ministers and lawmakers, had sent congratulatory remarks to Tsai for her inauguration, she said.
As Brazil adheres to a one China policy, it does not have diplomatic relations with Taiwan, but the two nations maintain unofficial ties through representative offices.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching