Taiwan will try ‘until the last minute’ to preserve Honduras ties

Beijing, Mar 16 (EFE).- Taiwan will continue “until the last minute” doing everything possible to preserve its diplomatic relations with Honduras, a country that stated its intention to establish them with China, which would lead to the ones it now maintains with the self-governing island.

Jeff Liu, Taiwanese Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman, said Thursday in a press conference on the importance for Taipei of ties with the Central American nation, which Taiwan will help “in every possible way.”

Liu also shot back at Honduran Foreign Minister Enrique Reina, who said Wednesday that Taiwan never responded to a request from Tegucigalpa for the island to double the annual amount of economic aid it provides to his country and that it also turned a deaf ear to the request to renegotiate the debt.

That issue “does not represent the full picture of bilateral communications,” the spokesperson said.

Honduran President Xiomara Castro announced Tuesday on Twitter that she has ordered her country’s Foreign Minister Eduardo Enrique Reina to open diplomatic relations with China to fulfill her Government Plan.

Before her inauguration on Jan. 27, 2022, Castro said it was not on her agenda to open relations with China.

The rupture of relations with Taiwan by Honduras would reduce to 13 the number of countries with which Taipei maintains official diplomatic relations and would make the Central American nation the ninth – and the fifth Latin American – country that since 2016 has cut ties with the island to establish them with Chinese.

Four Latin American countries – Panama, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua – broke relations with Taiwan in recent years in favor of China.

In addition to Honduras, the countries with which Taiwan maintains diplomatic relations are Guatemala, Vatican City, Haiti, Paraguay, Eswatini, Tuvalu, Nauru, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Belize, the Marshall Islands and Palau.

Ties between Tegucigalpa and Taipei date back to 1941, when Taiwan’s official name – was still headquartered on the Chinese mainland.

China claims sovereignty over Taiwan, which it considers a rebel territory since Kuomintang nationalists retreated to the island in 1949 after losing the war against the communist army. EFE

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