Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

US urges the WHO to invite Taiwan

Taipei Times

The WHO logo is pictured at its headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, on Jan. 30.
Photo: Reuters

The US Mission in Geneva on Friday urged WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus to invite Taiwan to a major meeting that the body is to host next week, with the focus expected to be on the COVID-19 pandemic.

Taiwan’s referendums lag behind the concept

Yang Chun-chieh 楊峻杰

In a referendum on Sunday last week, Chileans voted with an overwhelming majority of 78.3 percent in favor of writing a new constitution to replace one that has been in place since the military dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet.

In Taiwan, the Constitution written and implemented by the old authoritarian regime remains firmly in place.

Not only is there a high threshold for constitutional amendments, there is also a ban on holding a referendum on whether to write a new constitution.

KMT still clinging onto myth about ROC

Chen Ching-kuen 陳慶坤

In a speech on Oct. 23, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) expressed the hope that the celebration of Retrocession Day would allow people to discuss and review the relationship between the Republic of China (ROC) and Taiwan, adding that the continued existence of the ROC is the only way to curb Taiwanese independence.

It is pretty obvious that all the talk about discussing and reviewing the relationship is just a smokescreen, and that the KMT’s main focus is to curb Taiwanese independence and safeguard the ROC.

Ko’s actions betray his declarations

Nicholas Yu 郁良溎

A few days before the Taipei Fine Arts Museum (TFAM) exhibition “The Secret South: From Cold War Perspective to Global South in Museum Collection” ended on Oct. 25, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City councilors Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) and Yu Shu-hui (游淑慧) launched a fierce attack on I-den-ti-ty (哀敦砥悌), a work by internationally renowned artist Mei Dean-E (梅丁衍), known as the “Father of Taiwan’s Dadaism.”

Lo and Yu said that the work — which uses humor to express the difficult diplomatic situation of Republic of China as a result of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) pressure — was “inappropriate” and could “incite xenophobia, or is intended only to give vent to people’s rage.”

Kissinger blindsided by Beijing

Joseph Bosco

Former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger, 97, is still intellectually sharp enough to offer his insights on the security situation facing the world.

Last month, in a virtual talk with the Economic Club of New York, he turned his attention to the increasingly dangerous confrontation between the US and the People’s Republic of China. In his view, if the two powers do not find a way to manage their rising tensions, “we will slide into a situation similar to World War I.”

Ezra Vogel is on the wrong side of history

Gerrit van der Wees

Ezra Vogel is a well-known figure in American academia.

For many decades he was a professor of social sciences at Harvard University, and in the 1970s and 1990s he was director of the university’s Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies.

His work primarily focused on China, Japan and Chinese-Japanese relations.

That is why it is surprising that he suddenly has some advice for President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on how to conduct relations with China.

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