Taiwan’s Foreign Minister Joseph Wu is slated to meet with former United States Secretary of Defense Mark Esper via videoconference later this month.
The conference is organized by the Washington-based McCain Institute and will take place on February 22. The two will discuss a range of pressing challenges, including security partnerships in the Indo-Pacific region, China’s rise, the emergence of authoritarianism, and the global spread of fake news.
Esper served as US defense secretary for over a year in 2019 and in 2020, before former US President Donald Trump fired him over Twitter. Esper is a West Point graduate, but also holds a master’s degree in public administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and a doctorate from George Washington University. He was Vice President of Government Relations at security contractor Raytheon and served as US Secretary of the Army before being tapped for Secretary of Defense.
Wu and Esper’s meeting is part of the McCain Institute’s event series called “Conversations with Secretary Esper”. Previous speakers include Latvia’s Defense Minister Artis Pabriks, Colombian President Iván Duque Márquez, Australia’s former defense minister Linda Reynolds, former British Prime Minister Theresa May, and former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt.