Taipei Times
Date: Dec 10, 2016
By: Staff writer, with CNA

The US Congress included for the first time a section on senior military exchanges with Taiwan as it passed its National Defense Authorization Act for the next fiscal year.

The Senate on Thursday voted 92-7 to pass the bill after it was voted through the House of Representatives 375-34 on Friday last week.

Section 1284 of the final version, which passed after coordination between the House and the Senate, states: “It is the sense of Congress that the [US] secretary of defense should conduct a program of senior military exchanges between the United States and Taiwan that have the objective of improving military-to-military relations and defense cooperation between the United States and Taiwan.”

Such a program should be conducted at least once each calendar year in both Taiwan and the US, the act says.     [FULL  STORY]