Taiwan scraps plan to send defence minister to US security conference
Island to send deputy, avoiding risk of stoking tensions between Washington and Beijing, analyst says
Taiwan’s defence minister will skip an annual security conference in the United States and send a deputy instead, a move that could avoid inflaming already tense relations between Washington and Beijing, observers said.
Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defence said on Monday that deputy minister Chang Guan-chung would attend the US-Taiwan Defence Industry Conference in Annapolis, Maryland, late next month, as he did last year.
Taiwanese news outlets quoted an unnamed official as saying that Defence Minister Yen Teh-fa was originally willing to take part in the event but later decided that he had to reassess the nature and timing of the visit to determine if it would benefit Taiwan.
The conference, first held in 2002, is organised by the US-Taiwan Business Council and is a “non-official platform for the two sides to discuss defence industry cooperation and exchanges”, according to the ministry.
The council invited Yen to the conference earlier this month and his decision on whether he would be the first Taiwanese defence minister to go since 2008 has been closely watched in Beijing.