Taipei Times
Date: Jul 02, 2016
By: William Lowther / Staff reporter in WASHINGTON

If Taiwan is excluded from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal, it would represent an “existential threat” to the nation, US-Taiwan Business Council president Rupert Hammond-Chambers said on Wednesday.

Failure to join would undermine Taiwan’s economy and undermine stability and security in the Taiwan Strait, he told a TPP conference at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.

“There is a geostrategic rationale,” Hammond-Chambers said.

He said that membership in the TPP was critical for rebalancing cross-strait relations and that Taiwan needed to find new markets and to participate in new agreements.     [FULL  STORY]