DPP inaugurates Washington, D.C. office

 

The DPP inaugurated its representative office in Washington, D.C. on the morning of June 14 at an official ceremony hosted by Chair Su Tseng-chang. The DPP’s Washington, D.C. office will operate under the official name of the Taiwan Democratic Progressive Party Mission in the U.S.

 

Present at the inauguration was Dr. Joseph Wu, who serves as the DPP’s Policy Research Committee Executive Director, and who will also be the DPP Representative to Washington, D.C. responsible for managing the office’s affairs. Guests at the event included: AIT Chairman Raymond Burghardt; AIT Managing Director Barbara Schrage; US-Taiwan Business Council Vice President Lotta Danielsson; Retired U.S. Foreign Service Officer John Tkacik; Former FAPA President Professor Chen Wen-yen; and Taiwanese American Association Washington, D.C. Chapter President Ding Hung Bin.

 

DPP Chair Su Tseng-chang said in his remarks at the reception that the DPP’s mission in the U.S. will exert all its efforts into expressing the wishes of the Taiwanese people to the U.S. community in order to strive for Taiwan’s foreign relations and to improve U.S.-Taiwan relations.

 

Chair Su further said that the DPP has always valued the good relationship and exchanges held between Taiwan and the U.S., and establishing an office in the U.S. has been a goal of the DPP that he promised to achieve when he was campaigning for the DPP’s chair position.

 

Chair Su praised the office’s location, which is near the White House, surrounded by beautiful parks and overlooking the Washington Monument from its windows. The office is located at 888 16^th Street on the 8^th Floor (8 being a lucky number in Taiwanese culture). He said that even though the office is small, with just merely a little over 150 square feet, he said, “as long as we are here, that’s what is important!”

 

He emphasized that the purpose of this office is to strive for Taiwan, especially showing its commitment to U.S.-Taiwan relations and to improve communications between both sides.

 

“Even though this office represents the DPP, it is not in competition with the KMT and the current representative office in Washington, D.C.,” he said. “We hope that we can both give it our all for Taiwan.”

DPP inaugurates Washington, D.C. office