Tsai reaffirms government commitment to expanding Taiwan-US ties

2023/03/06

President Tsai Ing-wen said March. 2 that Taiwan is committed to deepening its U.S. economic and trade partnership through a bilateral trade agreement and an agreement on avoidance of double taxation.
 
Tsai made the remarks while receiving Edwin Feulner, founder of Washington-based think tank The Heritage Foundation, at the Presidential Office in Taipei City. Tsai also took the opportunity to thank Feulner for Heritage’s long-term support of a stronger Taiwan-U.S. partnership.
 
According to Tsai, the foundation’s latest Index of Economic Freedom ranked Taiwan fourth in the world and second in the Asia-Pacific—the country’s best-ever performance. The government will further refine its fair, free and open economic environment while bolstering cooperation with democratic allies to maintain global supply chain security, she said.
 
Taiwan and the U.S. reopened talks under the Trade and Investment Framework Agreement in recent years and expanded dialogue across other platforms, Tsai said. These included two rounds of negotiations on last year’s newly established Initiative on 21st-Century Trade; the first meeting was held last October under the Technology Trade and Investment Collaboration framework and the third Economic Prosperity Partnership Dialogue was hosted last December, she added.
 
In response, Feulner said he has been encouraged to see broad bipartisan support for a closer bilateral relationship grow from within the U.S. recently, evidenced by events such as the visit by the U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi last year.
 
Feulner also strongly encouraged current U.S. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to visit Taiwan, as a follow up to Foreign Minister Jaushieh Joseph Wu and National Security Council Secretary-General Wellington Koo’s visit to Washington 10 days ago.


Source: Taiwan Today (https://taiwantoday.tw/index.php)