DISCRIMINATION: China sent an invitation to the WHO vaccines conference in Beijing on the same day the conference was being held, the minister of foreign affairs said
Taipei Times
Date: Mar 05, 2019
By: Lu Yi-hsuan and William Hetherington / Staff reporter, with staff writer
Taiwan did not participate in a WHO-organized vaccines conference in Beijing on Feb. 21 to protest the
A child receives a vaccination shot at a hospital in Huaibei in China’s Anhui Province on July 26 last year.Photo: AFP
global body’s denigration of the country, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said yesterday.
The WHO again left the issue of Taiwan’s participation to be handled by Beijing, which did not send an invitation until 1am on Feb. 21, the same day it was held in Beijing, Wu said at a meeting of the Legislative Yuan’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee.
Despite insisting that no one should be left behind when it comes to healthcare, the WHO always excludes Taiwan, Wu said, adding that he hoped the organization could engage in greater introspection and overcome its discriminatory treatment of the nation.
He made the statements in response to Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Mary Chen’s (陳曼麗) question on why going to the conference would have been a problem and why the ministry could not provide airline tickets for a delegation to attend it. [FULL STORY]
