The head of the Taiwanese parliament arrived in Lithuania
Photo by Paulius Peleckis (BNS). .
The head of the Taiwanese parliament, You Si-Kun, started his visit to Lithuania on Thursday evening, meeting with the head of the Seimas, Viktorija Čmilyte-Nielsen, in the center of the capital.
“We are going to talk about the further development of our cultural, economic and scientific relations,” the speaker of the parliament told BNS before the planned dinner.
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda and Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė will not meet with the head of the Taiwanese parliament. According to experts, the program of the visit and the Taiwanese rhetoric show that representatives of Lithuania and Taiwan are avoiding official contacts in order not to anger China.
According to V. Čmilytė-Nielsen, she meets her Taiwanese colleague because “they usually meet in politics of the same rank, it’s completely natural”.
She said she was not afraid that this bilateral meeting could be evaluated by China as building diplomatic relations.
“Lithuania, on the one hand, respects and adheres to its international obligations and agreements, but at the same time, as a sovereign state, it decides with whom to develop economic, cultural and trade relations. Our decision regarding the development of such relations with Taiwan is known to have been announced a long time ago, and we continue to develop those relations,” said the Speaker of the Seimas.
According to her, she will have a free conversation with her Taiwanese colleague about “the values that unite us, and about the international distance, and about the war in Ukraine, and about autocracies, and about the support of which democracy around the world.”
For his part, before the meeting, You Si-Kun said he was grateful to Lithuania for what it had done for Taiwan.
“Basically, this visit is a friendly visit. We came to express our gratitude to Lithuania. (…) The exam is most grateful that in July of last year, Lithuania decided to decide that the Taiwanese representative office did not fear China’s threats, because the ambassador was also recalled”, – BNS stated the policy.
“Lithuania’s courage and support for democracy fascinates us,” he added.
Laima Liucija Andrikienė, chairwoman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Seimas, also attended the dinner with the Taiwanese delegation.
On Friday in the Seimas, You Si-Kunas will meet with the vice-chairmen of the Seimas Radvile Morkūnaite-Mikulėniene, Paulius Saudargas, the chairperson of the Foreign Affairs Committee LL Andrikienes and the member of the European Affairs Committee Emaniuel Zingeris.
On that day, the Taiwanese delegation will visit the Museum of Occupations and Freedom Struggles, participate in a dinner at the invitation of the Chairman of the Parliament’s Relations with the Republic of China (Taiwan) Group, Matas Maldeikis.
On Saturday, the Speaker of the Taiwanese Parliament will visit Trakai, the National Art Gallery, the Vilnius Television Tower, Vilnius University, the Dawn Gate, and the Vilnius Cathedral.
Last year, as relations between Vilnius and Taipei deepened, a Taiwanese representative office was opened in Lithuania in autumn. China, which considers the island part of an indivisible country, supported the opening of a representative office on behalf of Taiwan as an attempt to act as a state.
After the opening of the representative office, Beijing undermined diplomatic relations with Lithuania and began to impose trade restrictions, due to which the European Union joined the World Trade Organization.
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