By J. Michael Cole
Why don’t we hear much about Taiwan in Washington D.C. anymore?
After delivering remarks at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace on February 27, U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy R. Sherman was asked a rather simple question by one of the journalists present: Why don’t we hear much about Taiwan in Washington, D.C. nowadays?
John Zang, a journalist with CTiTV in Taiwan, had good reasons to ask. After all, in Sherman’s entire presentation, which focused on the situation in Northeast Asia, Taiwan was only mentioned once. And in that one passing reference, her formulation — “our friendship with the people of Taiwan” — deftly skirted the possibility of Taiwan existing as a nation or state, or the fact that U.S. relations with the “people of Taiwan” are rather more substantial than mere friendship.
“Taiwan is not talked about a lot these days in this town,” Zang noted.
Sherman, who visited the region earlier that month, returned from her trip with an awareness of the “chronic dangers” that exist in that part of the world. And yet, when asked to explain why Taiwan isn’t mentioned much in Washington, Sherman struck an overly optimistic note.
“I will say part of the reason that Taiwan is probably not talked about as much as it once was is a good sign,” she said. “It means that Taiwan is stable, is prosperous, has a strong relationship with mainland China, that the concept of ‘one China’ and the Three Communiqués has become a standard, that the economic integration between Taiwan and mainland China is quite so — it is the status quo, that the political issues are worked out over time."
Read the full story at The Diplomat