President Tsai meets delegation from German Marshall Fund of the United States
On the morning of December 10, President Tsai Ing-wen met with a delegation from the German Marshall Fund (GMF), a Washington DC think tank. She praised the GMF for holding excellent trilateral forums with officials and scholars from Taiwan, the US, and Europe, where attendees discussed the challenges that China's sharp power poses to democracy, and sought to identify opportunities for cooperation. She also expressed hope that Taiwan and the US can enhance bilateral cooperation across the board, and together protect the values of freedom, democracy, and human rights.
In remarks, President Tsai welcomed the delegation to Taiwan, and congratulated the GMF for successfully gathering officials and scholars from Taiwan, the US, and Europe for trilateral forums in Washington DC and Warsaw earlier this year. Forum attendees explored the challenges that China's sharp power poses to democracy and also sought out numerous possible areas for cooperation.
The president pointed out that Taiwan is the United States' partner in the Indo-Pacific region, and we are very happy to see the US proposing initiatives promoting "a free and open Indo-Pacific region," and developing values-based international cooperation and global trade and investment programs.
The president noted that just last week the US Senate passed the Asia Reassurance Initiative Act of 2018, which supports close economic, political, and security relations between the US and Taiwan. The Act also calls on President Trump to conduct regular transfers of defense articles to Taiwan and to approve visits to Taiwan by high-ranking US officials in accordance with the Taiwan Travel Act. The Act emphatically demonstrates the friendship between Taiwan and the US, as well as the US' staunch support for Taiwan.
The president said she looks forward to continued enhancement of cooperation between Taiwan and the US in all fields. For example, many democratic countries are facing the challenge of disinformation, as Taiwan also did during this year's elections. Just over a month ago, the International Workshop on Defending Democracy through Media Literacy was held under the auspices of the US-Taiwan Global Cooperation and Training Framework. President Tsai expressed hope that there will be even more opportunities for cooperation in the future, and that the two parties will work together to defend the values of freedom, democracy, and human rights.
The president expressed confidence that the GMF and Taiwan share the same goal, because the GMF's Alliance for Securing Democracy was established to study counter-measures against malicious interference in democracies by foreign forces. She called for more bilateral exchanges on this topic during GMF delegation's visit.
In closing, the president emphasized that Taiwan's path to democracy has been a hard one.Taiwan is willing to share its democratic experience with the world and is determined to defend its hard-won democracy and freedom. She also expressed hope that Taiwan can work together with its like-minded partners in America and Europe to contribute even more to the development of democracy around the world.