Taiwan looks to help Europe build chip supply chain: Official

Taipei, Oct. 4 (CNA) Taiwan looks forward to helping facilitate Europe's ability to manufacture its own chips and build secure supply chains, Deputy Foreign Minister François Wu (吳志中) said Friday.

Wu made the comments at a German National Day event in Taipei, where officials from Taiwan and Germany lauded the recent groundbreaking ceremony at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.'s (TSMC) chip fab in Dresden in the eastern German state of Saxony.

"We are pleased that our countries are entering a new stage of trade and technology cooperation," Wu said, noting that in 2023, total trade between Taiwan and Germany exceeded US$22 billion.

He added that this made Germany Taiwan's largest European Union trading partner and Taiwan Germany's largest Asian trading partner.

Beyond trade and economics, Wu continued, Taiwan and Germany share the values of freedom, democracy, the rule of law and human rights.

He also commended the passage of German warships through the Taiwan Strait on Sept. 13, for the first time in 22 years, adding that such transits demonstrate Germany's "determination to... defend international law and the freedom of navigation."

Speaking in a similar vein, the German representative to Taiwan Jörg Polster also noted "the comprehensive interest in Berlin" in expanding exchange between Germany and Taiwan in many different fields.

Collaborations between Germany and Taiwan have gone beyond semiconductors, said Polster, head of the German Institute Taipei. TSMC's investment has paved the way for more joint research and academic cooperation between the two sides, he added.

The state of Saxony launched a training program this year that allows university students from Dresden University of Technology (TU Dresden) to come to Taiwan for six months to study at National Taiwan University and receive training at TSMC facilities.

More Taiwanese universities have become partners of the program and will be receiving German students in the near future, including National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, and National Cheng Kung University.

In a pre-recorded video, Saxony's science minister, Sebastian Gemkow, recalled living in East Germany under Communist rule as a child and later experiencing the collapse of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the reunification of Germany a year later.

Gemkow said he was "fortunate" to have lived in freedom since then, noting that "the creative power" nurtured in a free society had allowed for flourishing collaborations and partnerships between Taiwan and Germany today.

German National Day, also known as German Unity Day, is observed on Oct. 3 every year to mark reunification in 1990.

The German Institute Taipei represents Berlin's interests in Taiwan in the absence of formal diplomatic relations between the two sides.