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US senators push to upgrade Taiwan’s status in regional development bank
- Senators introduce bill seeking backing for the island’s admission to the Inter-American Development Bank as a non-borrowing member
- Aim is to ‘champion Taiwan’s international engagement and demonstrate our unwavering commitment to the people of Taiwan’, Senator Robert Menendez says
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Senior Democratic and Republican US senators introduced legislation on Wednesday seeking Washington’s backing for Taiwan’s admission to the Inter-American Development Bank as a non-borrowing member.
The bill is part of an ongoing effort in US Congress and elsewhere in Washington to boost the international profile of Taiwan, as tensions escalate between the democratic, self-ruled island and mainland China, which claims it as sovereign territory.
The measure would require the State Department to provide Congress with a strategy to secure diplomatic support for Taiwan’s membership, a promotion from its current observer status.
The Senate has already passed legislation directing the State Department to develop a strategy to assist Taiwan in obtaining observer status at the World Health Assembly, the World Health Organization’s decision-making body.
“We are committed to continue working to ensure the United States does everything in its power to champion Taiwan’s international engagement and demonstrate our unwavering commitment to the people of Taiwan,” Senator Robert Menendez, Democratic chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a statement.
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