President Tsai meets US CNAS Brimley Next Gen fellows
President Tsai Ing-wen met with fellows from the Shawn Brimley Next Generation National Security Leaders Program (Brimley Next Gen), a program run by the Center for New American Security (CNAS), on the morning of April 25. She expressed hope that Taiwan and the United States can further exchanges and interaction in such areas as military, trade, culture, and religion.
In remarks, the president welcomed the CNAS delegation to Taiwan again, and stated that many CNAS experts know Taiwan well and are good friends of Taiwan.
President Tsai expressed confidence that her guests have surely noticed that Taiwan-US relations have continued to grow closer over the past three years. This month marks the 40th anniversary of the Taiwan Relations Act, and over the past few weeks, she said, she has met with many friends from the United States. President Donald Trump also recently announced his administration's third arms sale package to Taiwan, further strengthening our substantive military cooperation. Of course, she added, she wishes to see further exchanges between Taiwan and the United States in other areas as well, including trade, culture, and religion.
President Tsai mentioned that CNAS launched the Countering High-Tech Illiberalism program under its CEO Richard Fontaine's leadership this past February. The program will explore how to prevent authoritarian countries from expanding their influence worldwide by infiltrating through technological means, especially by spreading disinformation.
The president stated that during this trip her guests will see how Taiwan is working to respond to the challenges posed by disinformation. Taiwan has been severely harmed by disinformation, she said, and we have profoundly experienced that democratic systems around the world are under serious threat from authoritarian countries that exploit freedom to harm freedom.
President Tsai pointed out that she has asked our national security agencies to perform deeper analyses of high-tech illiberal attacks and infiltration, and actively draw up methods to counter them. Last year, she added, Taiwan and the United States held an International Workshop on Defending Democracy through Media Literacy under the Global Cooperation and Training Framework. Through this workshop, she said, we learned more about how our countries are responding to disinformation.
Finally, the president stated that Internet technologies are constantly evolving, and that there is a substantial generational gap when it comes to tech savviness. This means that we need more time to communicate when discussing policies. All of the delegation members are outstanding young advisors and officials, she said, and she expressed confidence that they have a strong understanding of the Internet and new media. She looked forward to exchanging views with them, and wished them a smooth and successful trip.