Taiwan’s Bid for WHA participation as the WHO Faces Uncertainty – ISDP organized a roundtable discussion

April 29, 2025: On April 25, Dr. Klement Ruey-sheng Gu, Representative of Taipei Mission in Sweden, visited ISDP for a roundtable discussion on the topic of Taiwan and the World Health Assembly (WHA).

Taiwan under Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) leadership has demonstrated a firm commitment towards gaining meaningful participation in the United Nations (UN) World Health Organization (WHO) and its decision-making body the World Health Assembly, throughout the pandemic and after. Taiwan was internationally praised for its well-coordinated pandemic response. Its pandemic response has, in turn, underpinned arguments that it should enjoy greater inclusion in matters of the UN global health governance. As Taiwan seeks greater inclusion, the U.S. under President Donald Trump is moving to withdraw from the WHO. Despite President Trump’s executive order to leave, the U.S. Bureau of International Organizational Affairs, issued a statement that the U.S. still supports Taiwan’s meaningful UN participation.

The roundtable discussion was moderated by ISDP’s Executive Director Niklas Swanström, and was joined by ISDP research staff along with experts and practitioners from Stockholm’s academia and policy community. During the discussion, Taiwan’s bid for meaningful participation in the WHA was discussed along with the technical obstacles to Taiwan’s inclusion, how Taiwan can be supported, and what it means for Taiwan that the U.S. is withdrawing from the WHO.