REPRESENTATIVE SENSENBRENNER DISCUSSES U.S.-TAIWAN

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 TAIPEI 000186

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STATE PLEASE PASS USTR FOR ALTBACH, COMMERCE FOR
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E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/21/2019
TAGS: CH CVIS EAGR ECON ENIV ETRD MARR PREL TW
MASS, ICAO
SUBJECT: REPRESENTATIVE SENSENBRENNER DISCUSSES U.S.-TAIWAN
TIES AND CROSS-STRAIT RELATIONS WITH TAIWAN PRESIDENT AND
LEGISLATIVE SPEAKER

Classified By: Director Bill Stanton for reasons 1.4(b/d)


1. (C) Summary: Taiwan needed strong U.S. ties to pursue
cross-Strait rapprochement, President Ma Ying-jeou told
Representative James Sensenbrenner during their February 17
meeting. Sensenbrenner voiced support for a bilateral
extradition agreement and urged Taiwan to improve the
security of its passport as a step toward inclusion in the
visa waiver program. He urged Taiwan to repair the damage
done by its failure to implement a protocol opening the
market fully to U.S. beef imports, warning that legislative
Speaker Wang Jin-pyng's proposal to defer action until 2015
would cause Taiwan significant problems in the U.S. Congress.
While voicing support for Taiwan's efforts to participate in
ICAO, Sensenbrenner urged Taiwan to look beyond the UNFCCC,
which he described as a fatally flawed approach to climate
change. End Summary.

Economics and Trade Key to Taiwan's Survival
--------------


2. (C) President Ma Ying-jeou began his February 17 meeting
with Representative Sensenbrenner by expressing appreciation
for the recent U.S. decision to sell Taiwan a $6.4 billion
package of arms. Not only was the sale in line with the
Taiwan Relations Act (TRA),Ma said, it would also help give
his administration the confidence to continue efforts to
improve cross-Strait relations. Ma reviewed the progress on
cross-Strait issues and the economic, commercial and
transportation agreements signed since his inauguration in
May of 2008 and predicted that Taiwan and the mainland would
sign an Economic Framework Agreement (ECFA) by the end of

2010.


3. (C) Both Taiwan and the mainland were committed to
continued progress in expanding cross-Strait economic ties,
Ma said. For Taiwan, doing so was a matter of survival. For
decades, the island's economic vitality gave it the ability
to resist political pressure. Over the past decade, however,
Taiwan had lost ground on this front and ran the risk of
becoming economically marginalized, Ma suggested. For
example, he said, Taiwan did not belong to any of the 59
regional FTAs that had been signed by the end of 2009. The
only other country in the region which had not signed an FTA
in one form or another was North Korea, Ma noted. This had
commercial economic implications, since it made Taiwan
exporters less competitive. Breaking out of this box meant
first signing an ECFA deal. Once Taiwan and the mainland
reached a deal, Ma asserted, other countries would be willing
to negotiate FTAs with Taiwan.

U.S. Ties the Foundation of Cross-Strait Detente
-------------- ---


4. (C) Cross-Strait rapprochement needed to be accompanied
by improved ties between Taiwan and traditional partners such
as Japan, the EU and, most important, the United States, Ma
emphasized. Although there continued to be real concern,
particularly among cattle-state members of Congress, about
Taiwan's inability to meet its commitment to reopen fully its
market to U.S. beef, this would not affect the
recently-announced arms package, Sensenbrenner said. It
would be impossible for any democratically elected President
to oppose a unanimous resolution of the legislature, Ma said,
but his administration would work to ensure that there were
no obstacles to the U.S. beef products that could be imported
under the new law.


5. (C) Noting Taiwan's interest in concluding an extradition
agreement with the United States, Sensenbrenner emphasized
the importance of putting in place a network of international
agreements to prevent criminals from exploiting loopholes to
evade justice. Taiwan had already returned many criminal
suspects to the United States, Ma said, but had difficulty
obtaining reciprocal treatment. Sensenbrenner stressed the

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importance of the law enforcement relationship working in
both directions.


6. (C) Turning to Taiwan's interest in joining the visa
waiver program (VWP),Sensenbrenner noted that U.S. law
required candidates have in place measures to ensure the
security of their travel documents. In this regard, Taiwan
needed to take action to require that all passport applicants
personally appeared before a government official before a
passport was issued. He observed that Taiwan had a security
interest in closing a loophole that had the potential to
allow PRC and other mala fide travelers to obtain Taiwan
travel documents. Once Taiwan took this step, and assuming
Taiwan's visa refusal rate continued to approach the 3%
statutory requirement, entry into VWP should be relatively
straightforward, Sensenbrenner said. Taiwan would continue
to work to reduce the applicant refusal rate, Ma replied.

ICAO, UNFCCC Top IO Priorities
--------------


7. (C) Expanding Taiwan's ability to participate meaningfully
in international organizations was another key goal of his
administration, Ma said. In particular, Taiwan hoped to gain
access to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC) and the International Civil Aviation Organization
(ICAO). Taiwan's importance as a regional aviation power and
the growing number of cross-Strait flights were good reasons
to support Taiwan's ICAO participation, Sensenbrenner said.
At the same time, however, he expressed skepticism about the
long-term viability of the UNFCCC. The failure of the
Copenhagen meeting suggested that it was only a matter of
time before countries moved from a UN-centric,
consensus-based approach, Sensenbrenner said, to one based on
less ambitious agreements among like-minded actors.

Legislative Speaker on Beef, Passport Security
-------------- -


8. (C) In a February 21 lunch with Legislative Yuan (LY)
Speaker Wang Jin-pyng, Sensenbrenner underscored the negative
impact the LY's decision to amend the Food Sanitation Act to
prohibit the importation of certain U.S. beef products. The
United States was the only major country to stand by Taiwan's
side, Sensenbrenner noted, and we would not promote (or serve
to our children) a product that we believed was unsafe. Wang
responded that the revision to the law could be reviewed as
"early" as 2015, or 10 years after the last known discovery
of a BSE-infected animal in the United States. Allowing the
problem to fester for 5 years was unlikely to be
well-received in Congress, Sensenbrenner pointedly observed.


9. (C) Sensenbrenner urged Wang to take the legislative steps
needed to strengthen the security of Taiwan's travel
document, both to improve Taiwan's eligibility for inclusion
in the VWP, but also to keep fraudulently-acquired passports
out of the hands of illegal immigrants and other mala fide
travelers. Wang agreed that this was a worthwhile goal and
suggested that there were non-legislative fixes to the
problem.


10. (SBU) Representative Sensenbrenner did not have an
opportunity to clear this cable before leaving Taipei.
STANTON