Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

China is no friend of Washington

Parris Chang 張旭成

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Jan. 24 that his country was resolved to produce its own highly enriched uranium — a long-standing bone of contention between Tehran and the West. The West offered Iran a draft nuclear deal last November under a resolution of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that called for Tehran to trade about 80 percent of its domestically produced low-grade uranium for highly enriched nuclear fuel from France and Russia.

The uranium would then be converted into fuel rods and returned to Iran for use in the medical research. Such an arrangement was designed to reduce Iran’s ability to make a nuclear weapon quickly and buy more time for negotiations. Iran has rejected the offer.

The 'one-term' specter over Ma and Obama

Taiwan News Editorial

In the wake of electoral setbacks suffered by United States President Barack Obama's Democratic Party, the Taiwan news media could not refrain from comparing the situation of the U.S. president with his counterpart, President Ma Ying-jeou of the rightist Chinese National Party (Kuomintang).

After all, Ma's ruling KMT has similarly suffered a series of defeats at the polls, beginning with a stunning victory by the opposition Democratic Progressive Party in a legislative by-election in Yunlin County in September, followed by the loss of benchmark Yilan County and a poorer-than-expected vote tally in the Dec. 5 "three-in-one" local polls and a DPP sweep of three legislative by-elections Jan. 9.

Ma and Obama: like night and day

Taipei Times Editorial

Last year was a bad one for national leaders around the world, most of whom were unable to hold their heads high. Although it is difficult to satisfy the public at a time of economic downturn, high unemployment, global warming and complex domestic political, economic and social problems, this is a test of our leaders.

Like US President Barack Obama, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) started off with high approval ratings and has since seen his popularity drop. But these two leaders have responded very differently to the situation.

Central bank must be independent

Taipei Times Editorial

In recent days and weeks, the central bank has been busy refuting market rumors and media speculation that its repeated warnings on inflows of hot money and its checks on banks’ foreign-exchange transactions and forward trades have caused a decline on the stock market.

For its part, the central bank has done what it is required to do to safeguard the nation’s economy, monetary policy and price stability in the long term, although its recent rhetoric did have a direct impact on the exchange rate of the New Taiwan dollar and indirectly on the stock market. Make no mistake, the currency markets can impact equity markets in various ways — and vice versa.

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