President Ma Ying-jeou met with Netherlands Trade and Investment Office in Taipei Representative Menno Goedhart on the morning of May 21 at the Presidential Office and expressed his best wishes to Representative Goedhart in the Rukai language.
The president noted that Representative Goedhart has been in Taiwan for eight years. Besides his duties in promoting bilateral relations, which are the same as those carried out by the representatives or ambassadors from other countries to the ROC, he has also been involved in a pursuit that sets him apart from his counterparts, the president said, for Representative Goedhart takes advantage of his days off to travel all around Taiwan and carry out historical research. He has shown great enthusiasm and achieved singular success in this endeavor, focusing especially on Taiwan's indigenous people, among whom he has made good friends from many different tribes. His interest in Taiwan's history stems from the fact that the Dutch arrived in Anping (part of modern-day Tainan City) in 1624, marking the beginning of a long relationship with Taiwan. Previously, the China Times published an article describing how Representative Goedhart drank millet wine with the head of the Rukai tribe. This helped to clear the air of 300 years of resentment between the tribe and the Dutch, the president said, noting that he was extremely moved by this.
President Ma noted that the Netherlands ranks as Taiwan's second largest trading partner in Europe, behind only Germany, with bilateral trade last year hitting US$6 billion. The Netherlands was among the earliest investors in Taiwan, and relations between the two countries are quite close. President Ma expressed his hope that relations between the two countries will continue to move forward. In particular, he said, tension in the Taiwan Strait has abated considerably in light of the improved relationship between Taiwan and mainland China. The president said he expects economic and trade activities between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait to continue to increase in the future and said he hopes that the Netherlands will increase its investments in Taiwan.
President Ma recalled that 18 or 19 years ago when he served as the vice chair of the Cabinet-level Mainland Affairs Council, the Dutch conglomerate Philips was planning to establish a training center here to train its employees from mainland China and pass along the Taiwan experience. At the time, relations between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait were not yet fully on track, and therefore the opportunity to establish this facility was lost, he said. While that was the situation 18 years ago, the situation today is entirely different, the president said. The president said he hopes that companies from Europe and Taiwan will enter into strategic alliances and take advantage of Taiwan's outstanding location at the center of East Asia to develop business opportunities not just in mainland China but also in the broader East Asian region. In the future, the president remarked, relations between Taiwan and other countries in the region will progress significantly thanks to the improvement in cross-strait relations.
The president stated that he has visited the Netherlands many times, and has been impressed by that nation's emphasis on the arts, culture, and environmental protection. He also commented that the National Museum of History in Taipei earlier this year held a special Van Gogh exhibit, which he found time to visit. He added that he believes there are many areas in which cultural and economic interaction can be strengthened between the two countries.
Representative Goedhart expressed his appreciation to President Ma for taking time out of his busy schedule to meet with him. He said that in traveling the island he has discovered that Taiwan is a very special place. Over the past three years, he said, he has taken advantage of his days off to collect information from throughout Taiwan. In particular, he has relied on oral histories to understand the history of the Dutch in Taiwan. He said he is currently carrying out a research project and is seeking to attract the participation of National Cheng Kung University in Tainan and Leiden University in order to create a communications platform for research and education on the history between Taiwan and the Netherlands. Academic writings, he said, will be used to make known the results of research, and will be preserved in the databases at the two institutions. Representative Goedhart also said his government is willing to provide scholarships for Taiwan students to research the history of the Dutch presence in Taiwan.
Representative Goedhart was accompanied to the Presidential Office in the morning by Deputy Foreign Minister Lyushun Shen to meet President Ma. Also sitting in on the meeting was National Security Council Deputy Secretary-General Chih-kung Liu.