TAIPEI, 12 Jul: Paraguay\u2019s president-elect, Santiago Pena, committed to mainta-ining diplomatic ties with Taiwan on Wednesday, going against a trend of Taipei\u2019s diplomatic allies switching their allegiance to China.
\nBeijing considers self-governed Taiwan a breakaway province and prohibits its diplomatic partners from having formal ties with Taipei.
\nPena, during a meeting with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen, affirmed \u201cour commitment as Paraguayans to stand with the people of Taiwan for the next five years.\u201d
\nParaguay is one of only 13 countries in the world \u2013 and the last remaining in South America \u2013 that reco-gnize Taiwan as a country and do not have diplomatic relations with China.
\nTaiwan\u2019s remaining diplomatic allies are generally smaller countries in Central America, the Caribbean and South Pacific, along with Eswatini in southern Africa and Vatican City.
\nChina has intensified its campaign to win over Taiwan\u2019s diplomatic allies since independence-leaning Tsai took office in 2016, in part by offering infrastructure investments to developing countries. It recently managed to sway Honduras, which broke ties with Taipei and opened an embassy in Beijing.
\nPena, who is visiting Taiwan with members of his incoming government as well as his wife and daughter through Saturday, said he wanted to boost trade and investment ties with Taiwan.
\n\u201cI will work for the next few years to convey to the people of Taiwan, mainly to the business community, that investing in Paraguay not only responds to a diplomatic interest but also responds to both nations\u2019 mutual economic benefit,\u201d he said.
\nTsai said Taiwan and Paraguay \u201chelped each other to overcome the challenge of the epidemic.\u201d
\n\u201cIn the face of the expansion of authoritarianism, we expect Taiwan and Paraguay to stand together on the frontline of free democracy and contribute to global stability and development,\u201d she said.
\nPena had promised to maintain ties with Taiwan on the campaign trail, unlike his main competitor, Efrain Alegre, who had advocated switching allegiance to China.
\nParaguay\u2019s government has in recent years seen intense lobbying from local beef and soy producers seeking greater access to the Chinese market. The senate in 2020 voted on a failed initiative to reconsider ties with Taipei.
\nPena was to also meet with Taiwanese Vice President William Lai, who is the governing Democratic Progressive Party\u2019s candidate in the January presidential election. (AP)<\/p>\n
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TAIPEI, 12 Jul: Paraguay\u2019s president-elect, Santiago Pena, committed to mainta-ining diplomatic ties with Taiwan on Wednesday, going against a trend of Taipei\u2019s diplomatic allies switching their allegiance to China. Beijing considers self-governed Taiwan a breakaway province and prohibits its diplomatic partners from having formal ties with Taipei. Pena, during a meeting with Taiwanese President Tsai […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-220265","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220265"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220265\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}