Wednesday, June 30, 2010

AIT welcomes ECFA signing, denies arm sales notification suspensions

Taipei, June 30 (CNA) The United States welcomes the signing of a historical cross-Taiwan Strait trade agreement and its policy on arm sales to Taiwan remains unchanged, the top U.S. diplomat in Taiwan said Wednesday.

"We welcome the kind of interaction between Taiwan and the mainland that leads to an agreement like this which can contribute to peace, stability and prosperity in the region. We're encouraged by this development, " said William Stanton, Director of the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Taipei Office, on the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), which was signed by Taiwanese and Chinese officials in Chongqing, China Tuesday.

The agreement, which still has to be reviewed by Taiwan’s legislature before going into effect, aims to liberalize cross-Strait trade with measures including reduce tariffs, relax trade regulations and allow market access to each other.

Stanton said that the AIT, the U.S. representative office in Taiwan, has“no comments on the agreement per se because we haven't read the complete texts and haven't had the chance to study it, ”but in general the U.S. would like to emphasize the positive development of the pact since it indicates“a level of interaction and cooperation that's welcomed by the region and the world.” He went on to deny a report in a U.S.-based Defense News magazine, which cited sources in Washington and Taipei and reported that the U.S. State Department has frozen three congressional notifications for new arm sales to Taiwan.

“No matter what the press may say, we abide by the TRA and what stipulated there. We continue on a regular basis to assess Taiwan's needs and to act with accordance to the assessment. Nothing's changed in our policy on arms sales to Taiwan,”he said.

Stanton noted that there is no“schedule”in terms of notification, which will only occur“when you need to notify the Congress because the arm sale is going to take place.” “So until that happens -- until the U.S. government makes a decision -- there's no notification. I think there's a misunderstanding,“he added.

The U.S. announced January 29 that it planned to sell US$6.4 billion worth of arms to Taiwan, which subsequently sparked China’s protest.

According to the Defense News report, three notifications have been frozen to until spring next year but the contents of those notifications were not confirmed. It also reported that a program to upgrade Taiwan’s aging F-16 A/B fighter aircraft was not included in the freeze as it has yet to enter the notification stage.

(By Chris Wang) enditem