Day: August 2, 2022

BAKU, Azerbaijan, August 2. Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in no way contradicts longstanding United States policy, Trend reports citing her statement.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Members of a Congressional Delegation issued this statement upon arrival in Taiwan. This visit is the first official visit to Taiwan by a Speaker of the United States House of Representatives in 25 years.

According to her, the US Congressional delegation’s visit to Taiwan honors America’s unwavering commitment to supporting Taiwan’s vibrant Democracy.

“Our visit is part of our broader trip to the Indo-Pacific, including Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea and Japan — focused on mutual security, economic partnership and democratic governance. Our discussions with Taiwan leadership will focus on reaffirming our support for our partner and on promoting our shared interests, including advancing a free and open Indo-Pacific region. America’s solidarity with the 23 million people of Taiwan is more important today than ever, as the world faces a choice between autocracy and democracy,” the speaker noted.

“Our visit is one of several Congressional delegations to Taiwan – and it in no way contradicts longstanding United States policy, guided by the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979, U.S.-China Joint Communiques and the Six Assurances. The United States continues to oppose unilateral efforts to change the status quo,” said the statement.

Source: TREND News Agency

His Excellency, Prak Sokhonn, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation of the Kingdom of Cambodia.

Distinguished guests, Ladies and Gentlemen.

Thank you all for joining us this morning for the official opening of the Cambodia-Singapore Cooperation Centre (CSCC).

I am delighted to be back in Phnom Penh. It is incredible how six months have just flown by – it just shows you how busy we have been. Cambodia is one of Singapore’s oldest friends. In fact, Singapore’s founding Prime Minister Mr Lee Kuan Yew and the late King-Father Norodom Sihanouk laid very strong foundations for our relations even before Singapore’s independence, and therefore, even before Cambodia’s travails. Today, our countries both enjoy growing trade and investment and people-to-people links, as well as very close cooperation on human resource development.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Singapore Cooperation Programme (SCP). It also marks 20 years of Singapore’s technical cooperation with Cambodia under the Initiative for ASEAN Integration (IAI). We established the Cambodia-Singapore Training Centre in 2002, after ASEAN leaders launched the IAI in 2000 in order to support capacity building in the newer ASEAN member (states), including Cambodia. Since then, we have welcomed more than 10,700 Cambodian government officials to our IAI courses and more than 16,600 have participated in courses under the Singapore Cooperation Programme. I believe there a few alumni members here today and they have just put a human face to these numbers that I have just cited.

In 2018, Singapore pledged to enhance the IAI Training Centres to Singapore Cooperation Centres, or the SCCs. These centres serve as an integrated platform for Singapore to deliver capacity building programmes more holistically.

The CSCC was the first Centre to begin operations in July 2018. It has since conducted 76 runs of IAI training courses covering a wide range of topics, including using innovation and technology to promote food security and safety, increasing digital adoption by Micro Small and Medium Enterprises and healthcare sectors to accelerate business recovery, enhance resilience of public health systems, as well as the sharing of best practices on innovation in public policy and governance. The CSCC brings Singapore entities and ASEAN Dialogue Partners together, including our foreign development assistance agencies in order to provide more relevant and up to date capacity building programmes in Cambodia.

For example, the CSCC partnered with Civil Service College Singapore, Temasek Foundation, and the Cambodian Ministry of Civil Service and the Royal School of Administration to organise a “Leadership Development Programme” for senior Cambodian officials in February 2020. The CSCC is also working with the German Agency for International Cooperation on providing English Language training as part of the “Investment Promotion and Private Sector Development Fellowship Programme” for provincial officials from areas like Banteay Meanchey, Battambang, and Siem Reap. We welcome collaboration opportunities with potential partners to provide more targeted joint-training programmes for Cambodian government agencies.

The last few years have been very challenging for the whole world, and of course for Cambodia and Singapore too. But I am heartened, and I am sure DPM Prak Sokhonn will agree with me that Singapore and Cambodia have come through this crisis together, stronger and even more confident of our mutual support for one another. I recall that when we met here six months ago, we had agreed to expand bilateral cooperation, especially in new areas such as connectivity, infrastructure development, fintech and digital economy. I am here to say that we remain committed to supporting Cambodia.

As we emerge from the pandemic, we look forward to having even more Cambodian officials back in the CSCC in-person for the IAI courses and other CSCC programmes. We also look forward to working with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MFAIC) of the Kingdom of Cambodia to further expand our technical cooperation through the CSCC.

My good friend, DPM Prak Sokhonn. As Cambodia matures, develops and becomes even more advanced – as I was flying in (I noticed) you have a spectacular city – it is so obvious that much has happened here. I would also say that our relations have reached new heights. The reason why we called it cooperation and mutual exchange is because that is exactly what we mean. We learn from you, you learn from us. Together, we are even better and more effective. Thank you again for being here in person. I know that you are going to be very busy for the next three, four days, but you have made time for us today.

Thank you so much, my dear friend.

Source: Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Government of Singapore

When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi flew into Taiwan on an Air Force passenger jet Tuesday, she became the highest-ranking American official in 25 years to visit the self-ruled island. China announced military maneuvers in retaliation, even as Taiwanese officials welcomed her and she headed to her hotel.

The reason her visit ratcheted up tension between China and the United States: China claims Taiwan as part of its territory, and it views visits by foreign government officials as them recognizing the island’s sovereignty.

President Joe Biden has sought to calm that complaint, insisting there’s no change in America’s longstanding “one-China policy,” which recognizes Beijing but allows informal relations and defense ties with Taipei.

Pelosi portrays her high-profile trip as part of a U.S. obligation to stand with democracies against autocratic countries, and with democratic Taiwan against China.

A look at some of the issues at play:

Why did Pelosi go to Taiwan?

Pelosi has made a mission over decades of showing support for embattled democracy movements. Those include a trip in 1991 to Tiananmen Square, where she and other lawmakers unrolled a small banner supporting democracy, as frowning Chinese security officers tried to shut them down. Chinese forces had crushed a homegrown democracy movement at the same spot two years earlier.

The speaker is framing her Taiwan trip as part of a broader mission at a time when “the world faces a choice between autocracy and democracy.” She led a congressional delegation to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv in the spring, and her latest effort serves as a capstone to her years of promoting democracy abroad.

“We must stand by Taiwan,” she said in an opinion piece published by The Washington Post on her arrival in Taiwan. She cited the commitment that the U.S. made to a democratic Taiwan under a 1979 law.

“It is essential that America and our allies make clear that we never give in to autocrats,” she wrote.

What is the U.S. stand on Taiwan?

The Biden administration, and Pelosi, say the United States remains committed to its “one-China policy.”

Taiwan and mainland China split during a civil war in 1949. But China claims the island as its own territory and has not ruled out using military force to take it.

China has been increasing both diplomatic and military pressure in recent years. It cut off all contact with Taiwan’s government in 2016 after President Tsai Ing-wen refused to endorse its claim that the island and mainland together make up a single Chinese nation, with Communist Beijing the sole legitimate government.

Beijing sees official American contact with Taiwan as encouragement to make the island’s decades-old de facto independence permanent, a step U.S. leaders say they don’t support.

How is the Chinese military handling the tension-raising trip?

Soon after Pelosi’s arrival, China announced a series of military operations and drills, which followed its promises of “resolute and strong measures” if Pelosi went through with her visit.

China’s People’s Liberation Army said the maneuvers would take place in the waters and skies near Taiwan and include the firing of long-range ammunition in the Taiwan Strait.

China’s official Xinhua News said the army planned to conduct live-fire drills from Thursday to Sunday across multiple locations. An image released by the news agency indicated that the drills were to take place in six different areas in the waters surrounding Taiwan.

Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said early Wednesday that China had sent 21 planes flying toward Taiwan, 18 of them fighter jets. The rest included an early warning plane and an electronic warfare plane.

How has the United States responded?

While Biden has expressed some wariness about Pelosi’s trip, the administration has not openly opposed it and said it is up to Pelosi to decide whether to go.

Ahead of Pelosi’s visit, the American military increased its movements in the Indo-Pacific region. The aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan and its strike group were in the Philippine Sea on Monday, according to officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations.

The Reagan, the cruiser USS Antietam and the destroyer USS Higgins left Singapore after a port visit and moved north toward their home port in Japan. The carrier has an array of aircraft, including F/A-18 fighter jets and helicopters, as well as sophisticated radar systems and other weapons.

Is armed conflict a risk?

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Biden both have made clear they don’t want that. In a call with Biden last week, Xi echoed a theme of Biden’s — their countries should cooperate on areas where they can.

The biggest risk is likely an accident if China tries the kind of provocative maneuver it’s increasingly been executing with other militaries around the South China Sea. Those include close fly-bys of other aircraft or confronting vessels at sea.

However, when it comes to the United States, with the world’s strongest military, “despite a chorus of nationalistic rhetoric, China will be careful not to stumble into a conflict with colossal damages on all fronts,” said Yu Lie, a senior research fellow at the Chatham House think tank.

For China, the best approach is patience and time, Jie said — building toward the day when its economy and military could be too big for the U.S. to challenge.

Source: Voice of America