President Tsai Ing-wen meets Senator Tammy Duckworth at the Presidential Palace on the 31st. Photo: Reprinted from the Presidential Palace YouTube
President Tsai Ing-wen warmly welcomed U.S. Senator Duckworth, who came to Taiwan last year to announce the donation of the new crown vaccine at the Presidential Palace today (31). After the previous U.S. government rejected Taiwan’s participation in the first round of the Indo-Pacific economic structure, Tsai also said for the first time that “Taiwan will continue to express its willingness to participate in the U.S. government.” In addition, when talking about Taiwan-U.S. cooperation to support Ukraine and sanction Russia, Tsai Ing-wen mistakenly said that “Taiwan and the United States have both imposed economic sanctions on Ukraine and also provided Ukraine’s assistance.”
On June 6 last year, Tammy Duckworth and two congressmen, Dan Sullivan (R-AK) and Chris Coons (D-DE), took a whirlwind military plane to visit Taiwan, announcing that the United States would donate Taiwan 75 million doses of vaccine. Tsai Ing-wen was received in the VIP room of the Songshan headquarters. Duckworth came to Taiwan again yesterday and is expected to stay until June 1. Tsai Ing-wen met at the Presidential Palace this morning. Sun Xiaoya, director of the Taipei Office of the American Institute in Taiwan, was also present.
Tsai Ing-wen said that Senator Duckworth is very welcome to lead a delegation to visit again. When the epidemic in Taiwan was heating up in June last year, Duckworth, Sullivan and Senator Koons specially came to Taiwan with experts, and also brought the US government to Taiwan. There will be good news for Taiwan’s vaccine. At that time, Duckworth said that the United States would not allow Taiwan to fight alone, which moved the Taiwanese people quite a bit.
Tsai Ing-wen said that Taiwan and the United States are each other’s important economic and security partners in the Indo-Pacific region, fighting the epidemic together and defending democracy and freedom together. Since the beginning of this year, Russia has invaded Ukraine. Then Tsai mistakenly said, “Taiwan and the United States have both imposed economic sanctions on Ukraine and provided Ukraine’s assistance.” However, the government’s translator corrected this error when translating it into English.
Tsai Ing-wen said that just last week, President Biden of the United States and Prime Minister Kishida of Japan issued a joint statement after their talks, reiterating the importance of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait; a few days ago, Secretary of State Blinken’s speech also emphasized that maintaining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait is a global issue. Security and prosperity are paramount.
Tsai Ing-wen said that she would like to thank the U.S. government and Congress for attaching importance to the stability of the Taiwan Strait, and especially to Senator Duckworth for caring about Taiwan security issues over the years.
Tsai Ing-wen pointed out that Duckworth took the lead in proposing the “Taiwan Partnership Act” in July last year, which won bipartisan support. Therefore, the US Department of Defense is actively discussing the cooperation and exchanges between the National Guard and Taiwan. Recently, Duckworth also further proposed a bill to support the deployment of the US military in the Indo-Pacific, and to give priority to the security situation of Taiwan.
Tsai Ing-wen said that she expects Taiwan and the United States to deepen and strengthen regional security cooperation. At the same time, facing the challenges of the post-epidemic era, Taiwan and the United States have also taken stock of various substantive economic and trade cooperation issues. For the Indo-Pacific economic structure proposed by the U.S. government, Taiwan will continue to express its willingness to participate in the U.S. government. “And we also expect that in the short term, Taiwan and the United States will plan a specific way to jointly deepen the bilateral economic and trade partnership between Taiwan and the United States.”
Tsai Ing-wen said that she would like to take this opportunity to thank the United States for speaking up for Taiwan at the World Health Assembly this month.
Tsai Ing-wen also said that lastly, I would like to mention the Chinese version of Duckworth’s memoirs, “Every Day to Live,” which has received good reviews since it was published in Taiwan at the beginning of this year. From the book, we can see Duckworth’s professionalism in national defense and military affairs, her perseverance in overcoming all difficulties, and her persistence in the value of justice. She is very happy to recommend this book and let more Taiwanese people realize Good friends of the United States are also inspired by it.