Taiwan will not impose retaliation duties on the USA. President: We want cooperation

On Monday, the president of Taiwan Lai Ching-Te declared readiness to talk to the US authorities regarding the abolition of duties, proposing “zero customs” as a starting point for negotiations. This reaction occurs after the US introduces additional tariffs of 32 percent. for some products from Taiwan.

“To ensure the competitiveness of Taiwan, we will increase imports from the USA and introduce other funds,” Lai wrote on the X platform. “Cooperation, we will start a golden era of common prosperity,” he added.

The government in Taipei criticized the American duties last week as “unfair” and “very unreasonable”, but refrained from threatening retaliation against its main partner in the field of security.

Lai, meeting representatives of small and medium -sized enterprises on Sunday, emphasized that Taiwan would maintain their current investment obligations in the USA. He also announced the appointment of a negotiating team, which will conduct talks with the American administration.

The president noted that Taiwanese companies, including TSMC, a global leader in the production of semiconductors, plan to further increase investments in the United States. TSMC has recently announced an additional USA investment worth $ 100 billion.

Although the semiconductor sector – in which Taiwan dominates and which is a source of tensions between Washington and Taipei – has been excluded from new US duties, analysts warn that the tariffs for components will be negatively affected by this industry, which is the driving force of the global economy.

Lai also declared his readiness to remove non -disgust barriers hindering trade from the US to facilitate negotiations. Taiwan is also considering increasing the purchases of agricultural, industrial and energy products from the USA, and the Ministry of Defense has already presented plans to buy weapons.

The US, like most countries of the world, do not maintain official diplomatic relations with Taiwan, but they are its largest supplier of weapons. Taipei stands in the face of the growing military and political pressure on the part of China, which consider the island to be their territory and do not rule out the use of force to take over power over it.

Krzysztof Pawliszak (PAP)

KRP/ AP/