Taiwan authorities are considering the set up of a $200 million fund that they would invest in Lithuania as it tries to fight against China's continued aggressive claim of the island as part of its territory and as Taipei continuously loses allies against Beijing.
Taipei officials said that they plan to make their first investment in the Baltic state later this year and that the money is guaranteed by its national development fund and central bank. The situation comes after Lithuania authorities allowed Taiwan to open a de facto embassy within its territory which suggests a growing relationship between the two nations.
$200 Million Lithuania Investment Fund
Days after the announcement, China downgraded its diplomatic relations with Lithuania as Taiwan's deputy minister of foreign affairs Harry Ho-Jen Tseng told Lithuania that it was time for Taipei to help with Lithuania's difficulties. It also comes as Taiwan is now sharing recommendations with the public on how to drink and cook with rum after it purchased 20,000 bottles of Lithuanian rum that was headed for China, BBC reported.
The fund will be used by Taiwan to invest in the areas of semiconductors, lasers, biotechnologies, and research in Lithuania. The details of the funding were announced by the head of the Taiwanese Representative Office in the capital Vilnius, Eric Huang, during a Wednesday press conference.
Huang added that Taiwan will also be sending out a team to assess Lithuania's aspirations to develop a semiconductor industry. The Baltic state is also seeking to build closer economic ties with Taipei as it expects to gain a foothold in the latter's semiconductor sector since last year.
Despite the announcement of the investment, Taiwan's National Development Council and Lithuania's Economy Ministry have not yet discussed the details of the fund. Additionally, Huang said that Taiwan's central bank was working on an even larger fund for investments, Aljazeera reported.
Taiwan Versus China
The situation comes as, last month, Nicaragua has broken diplomatic relations with Taiwan and showed support for China. The announcement further reduced the number of countries that recognized Taipei, a self-governing island, as a sovereign nation.
Nicaragua's foreign minister was the one that announced the decision that dealt a severe blow to the progress that Taiwan had recently made to win broader international support, if not official recognition by other nations. After the announcement, United States President Joe Biden invited two Taiwanese officials to join the virtual "summit for democracy."
On top of Lithuania, other nations in Eastern Europe, which were previously under the control of the Soviet Union, have deepened their economic and cultural ties with Taipei, including the Czech Republic, Poland, and Slovakia. The situation has caused Taiwan to become a potential flashpoint in China's relationship with other nations worldwide.
Nicaragua's foreign minister Denis Moncada Colindres did not detail the reasons that authorities chose to break their relationship with Taiwan. However, China has continually pressured Taipei's allies to sever their ties with the island as Beijing continues its aggressive claim of the region as part of its territory under what it calls the "one China" policy, the New York Times reported.
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