President Ma on Nov. 2 named Lien his special envoy to the summit meeting of the regional grouping, which is slated to take place in Singapore on Nov. 14-15 based on the theme of "Sustaining Growth, Connecting the Region."

This will be the second consecutive year that Lien, who is an honorary chairman of the governing Kuomintang (KMT) , represents Taiwan at the APEC leaders summit.

Lien also attended last year's summit held in Peru, which made him the highest-ranking former Republic of China official ever allowed to take part in the annual summit.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Henry Chen would not elaborate on the leaders Lien might meet at the summit, but he said Lien would hold a pre-departure press conference on Nov. 9.

Taiwan gained full APEC membership in 1991, making it one of the few major international organizations the country has been allowed to join. It is an important platform for Taiwan's engagement in economic and trade cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region.

Taiwan's presidents, however, have never attended the summit meetings themselves as a result of pressure from Beijing, but instead named a special envoy to the meeting on their behalf.

U.S. President Barack Obama, Chinese President Hu Jintao and Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama are scheduled to deliver speeches at this year's summit.