TAIWAN WANTS TO DO EXPORT CONTROLS RIGHT

C O N F I D E N T I A L TAIPEI 002682

SIPDIS

STATE PASS AIT/W
STATE FOR EAP/RSP/TC, EAP/EP, AND NP/ECC/MCCELLAN
STATE FOR INR/EC/NKWG

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/20/2015
TAGS: ETTC PARM PINR PREL PTER TW
SUBJECT: TAIWAN WANTS TO DO EXPORT CONTROLS RIGHT

REF: A. TAIPEI 2509

B. TAIPEI 2475

C. TAIPEI 543

D. TAIPEI 1706

Classified By: AIT DIRECTOR DOUGLAS H. PAAL, REASON 1.5 (B),(D)


1. (C) AIT/T believes that Taiwan wishes to move forward in
implementing an effective export control regime, largely due
to sustained US interest in this topic. On April 7, when
AIT/T Deputy Director demarched the Ministers of Foreign and
Economic Affairs regarding export controls, both Ministers
assured us of Taiwan's commitment to enhancing export
controls. Minister of Foreign Affairs Mark Chen said he was
departing from the meeting for the airport to fly with
President Chen Shui-bian to the Vatican for the funeral of
Pope John Paul II and would personally brief the President on
US concerns about export controls (ref D). More recently, we
have had a series of meetings with National Security Council
(NSC),Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA),and Board of
Foreign Trade (BOFT) officials that all point to Taiwan's
willingness to strengthen its export control program. NSC
Deputy Director General Wang Hsi-tien told us (ref A),and
asked TECRO/W to formally advise Washington Agencies, that he
would prefer to have a US experts group visit Taiwan before
he leads a high-level Taiwan delegation to the US. MOFA
North American Affairs Director General Victor Chin told
AIT/T Deputy Director that MOFA and NSC have consulted on the
sequencing of the visits and that Taiwan's NSC and MOFA agree
with Wang's proposal.


2. (C) This sequencing makes sense to us. When the US
North Korea Working Group delegation headed by David Asher
visited in February 2005 (ref C),the US agreed to send an
experts group to help Taiwan put together an effective export
control regime. The NSC and the Board of Foreign Trade has
regularly reminded us of this commitment, carefully couching
the quiet reminders as requests for assistance to help
develop Taiwan,s export control system and to promote
information sharing on processing permits for trade in
sensitive technologies. A recent example is AIT/T Econ
Chief's June 20 call on BOFT Chief Secretary Peter Ho to
discuss disposal of Phosphorus pentasulfide (P2S5),reported
via septel. Ho took this opportunity to quietly ask if the
US had any comments on the Taiwan draft export control
program (ref B). Ho said that he is anxious to brief
Taiwan's machine tool industry on the plan in an effort to
gain industry buy-in. Clearly, he wants to have US input
before sharing it with his industry.


3. (C) Absent consultations with the US experts group, BOFT
drafted Taiwan,s export control regime (ref B),in part to
demonstrate Taiwan,s commitment to following through on
export controls. Unfortunately, the plan has at least one
major omission. It only deals with exports to North Korea.
The plan does not seem to address the possibility of
transshipping goods through third countries to North Korea or
shipments to other destinations of concern. We believe that
Taiwan is prepared to address this omission and others. Both
NSC's Wang and BOFT Deputy Director General James Wu have
told us that Taiwan is willing to require export permits for
machine tool exports to destinations besides North Korea. We
believe the occasion provided by a visit from a US exports
group would be another opportunity to directly address this
issue with relevant Taiwan authorities and to build Taiwan,s
capacity to build an effective export control system.


4. Comment: (C) The timing of the experts visit is, of
course, dependent on resources available in Washington.
While Taiwan would welcome the experts visit in July, a
commitment and a date in the future for such a visit would
advance our export-control agenda. We believe it would also
be helpful to maintain the schedule for the second round of
EXBS training. We see no utility to holding off on the
planned EXBS training pending a decision or scheduling of the
experts visit. It seems to us that Taiwan is eager to have
US input in the improvement of Taiwan,s enhanced export
control plan, and this would be beneficial. We could point
out the need to provide for coverage of more destinations
than just North Korea. Undoubtedly, there are other areas in
which expert input could enhance the final product. Our
sense remains that Taiwan is willing to do what we ask, but
that it really needs substantial guidance on exactly what we
want and how Taiwan can do it.
PAAL