Young Kim Asks Sec. Janet Yellen Point Blank: Would You Support Taiwan Joining The IMF?

4 months ago

On Tuesday, Rep. Young Kim (R-CA) questioned Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on relations with Taiwan during a House Financial Services Committee hearing.

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Transcript

00:00House unanimously passed my bill, H.R. 540, the Taiwan Non-Discrimination Act.

00:07This will support Taiwan's membership at the IMF, where the statehood is not a prerequisite

00:14to join the international organizations, and the IMF has no conditions where statehood

00:21is not a requirement.

00:23And as you know, Taiwan is already, you know, it belongs to WTO and the Asian Development

00:30Bank.

00:31So if Taiwan seeks its membership at the IMF, would you support it?

00:37Well, you know, Taiwan is not, has not expressed any interest in joining the IMF.

00:45This is not a decision that the United States government—

00:49With all due respect, Secretary Yellen, that's why we passed the Taiwan Non-Discrimination

00:54Act, and we are hoping that you will work with us and fully support Taiwan's membership

01:02at the IMF.

01:04And obviously, it goes without saying, the world would benefit from having the input

01:09and expertise of the world's 21st largest economy, so I hope you will work with us.

01:15And the legislation is already passed out of the House.

01:18Sure.

01:19I guess what I can say is that we have supported greater engagement between the IMF and Taiwan,

01:28even with Taiwan being a non-member.

01:33We have urged surveillance activities and other IMF activities to work with Taiwan.

01:41Taiwan has indicated their expressed interest to join, so when that happens, I hope you

01:47will support that.

01:48So let me move on to the next question, since this is something that I know Representative

01:54Garbarino mentioned this earlier, so I echo his comments, but to address the growing problem

02:02of indebtedness of low-income countries, G20 nations and the Paris Club agreed to the common

02:09framework with the CCP.

02:11So can you speak of any of your efforts to force the CCP to make its sovereign lending

02:17more transparent through the common framework?

02:21So we have engaged thoroughly over a long period of time and deeply in every way we

02:31can with China to bring them to the table to participate actively in restructurings

02:40through the common framework.

02:42It's been frustrating, but I think that there has been some progress.

02:48We have urged the IMF, the World Bank, they've set up a sovereign debt roundtable in which

02:56it's a forum to discuss issues that China routinely raises that aren't really case-specific

03:07but broader.

03:10So I think we've made some progress there.

03:13There are several countries.

03:14Thank you, Secretary.

03:15Let's continue to be more vigilant in making sure that like-minded countries and with our

03:22allies that we can force the CCP to be more transparent.

03:25I'm going to move on to the next question.

03:28We cannot afford to cave in to CCP demands that private creditors should be ignored in

03:35debt restructuring negotiations.

03:37There should be comparable treatment between public and private creditors.

03:42As you know, private capital is a powerful tool to counter the CCP's debt diplomacy.

03:49Earlier this year, the US and CCP launched a bilateral counter-narcotics working group

03:54to counter the manufacturing and trafficking of all illicit synthetic drugs.

04:00But I'm afraid that we are giving away some of our leverage by lifting some sanctions.

04:06And once again, we're yielding to the empty promises made by CCP officials.

04:11So can you tell us about the role of Treasury and your role in the working group?

04:16Well, we participate in the counter-narcotics working group.

04:21And Treasury has also, under the auspices of a financial working group, we've established

04:30with our counterparts, led by the People's Bank of China, an anti-money laundering forum

04:37where we're working on best practices and also relates to counter-narcotics.

04:45So we have seen China take some action against firms that are involved in producing.

04:52I know last year when Xi Jinping and President Biden met, they also started the fentanyl

04:58working group and narcotics working group early this year.

05:02But we know from experience that we cannot solely rely on the commitments made by Xi

05:06Jinping and CCP officials.

05:08So I hope that you will do more to ensure that the CCP abides by the commitments that

05:14is established by working group.

05:15And I know you are participating, but please be more firm.

05:21We've taken sanctions actions ourselves against Chinese firms on this.

05:27My time's up.

Young Kim Asks Sec. Janet Yellen Point Blank: Would You Support Taiwan Joining The IMF?

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