Lien Chan, the ruling Kuomintang's honorary chairman, was named by President Ma Ying-jeou as his special envoy to the summit meeting of the regional economic grouping scheduled to take place in Singapore Nov. 14-15.

"I will have bilateral or multilateral talks with foreign leaders on the sidelines of the summit, and I will make it clear to them areas of issue about which Taiwan is concerned and what contributions Taiwan is ready to make to the world," Lien said at the airport prior to his departure for Singapore.

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.

The country's presidents, however, have never attended the summit meetings themselves as a result of pressure from Beijing, but instead have named special envoys to represent them.

This is the second consecutive year that Lien has represented Taiwan at the APEC leaders summit.

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

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.

(By Bien Chin-feng and Bear Lee)