On the night of April 9, 2019, President Tsai Ing-wen conducted a videoconference with import-ant opinion-makers in the US, including representatives of three major US think tanks: the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Brookings Institution, and the Woodrow Wilson Inter-national Center for Scholars. Richard Armitage, former US deputy secretary of state, served as moderator at the Washington end.
President Tsai noted that in a few hours it would be April 10 in Taipei, and that it was on this day 40 years ago that the US Congress passed the Taiwan Relations Act. The foresight and friendship of the act’s drafters, she said, have ensured peace in the Taiwan Strait and allowed Taiwan to become one of the freest countries in the world. Meanwhile, Taiwan–US relations have exhibited unprecedented stability. In particular, Taiwan is the US’ eleventh largest trading partner, and bilateral economic and trade relations are complementary rather than competitive. Taiwan also plays a vital role in areas such as economic diversification, the high-tech supply chain, and information secur-ity. Tsai added that Taiwan and the US share demo-cratic values and a democratic vision for the future, and are pushing back against the growing tide of authoritarianism around the world.
In the three-plus years of President Tsai’s term in office, her administration has promoted media literacy and women’s empowerment, and has strengthened Taiwan’s self-defense capabilities, while Taiwan’s economy has continued to grow. Despite the fact that mainland China has con-tinu-ally been acting to deny Taiwan’s right to particip-ate in international affairs and has increased the threat it poses to Taiwan, Tsai emphasized that Taiwan will continue to strengthen cooperation with the US and Japan in order to further economic prosperity and peace in the Indo–Pacific region.