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Palauan Baseball Team Trains in Taiwan, Strengthening Ties Through Sports

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By TaiwanPlus News

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Taiwan and Palau are advancing their 31 years of diplomatic ties beyond politics and onto the baseball diamond. As Palau gears up for the Pacific Mini Games in June, a mutual love of baseball has brought Palau’s national team to Taiwan for training. In this episode, the Palauan ambassador to Taiwan, David Adams Orrukem, discusses his country’s love of the sport and what Palau’s team is learning from Taiwan’s best players.

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Palau’s national baseball team arrived in Taiwan in May for intensive training at National Taiwan Sport University in Taoyuan, marking a new chapter in the growing diplomatic and cultural relationship between the two Pacific allies. 

The program, supported by Taiwan’s Sports Administration and coordinated in part by Palau’s government, comes ahead of the 2025 Pacific Mini Games in June, where Palau as the host nation hopes to improve on previous silver and bronze medal performances. 

 “Baseball is the game in Palau,” the country’s ambassador to Taiwan, David Orrukem, told TaiwanPlus in an exclusive interview. “Everybody in Palau grew up with baseball. Whether you like it or not, you're drawn to it.” 

The training camp represents the longest continuous period that the Palauan national team has spent in Taiwan. “That shows the best of our relationship between Palau and Taiwan,” Orrukem said. “And this is only the beginning.” 

According to Taiwanese sports official James Cheng, the initiative grew out of a conversation between Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te and President Surangel Whipps Jr. of Palau during President Lai’s most recent visit to Taiwan’s diplomatic allies in the Pacific region. “The Palauan president asked President Lai if their national team could come to Taiwan for training,” Cheng said. “They’ve always lost to Guam and they wanted to level up their game.” 

Ambassador Orrukem, a former school principal, expressed pride in seeing a number of his former students on the national team. “Seeing the ones that are here from the school that I was a principal of, you can see that their formation, when they play games, really shows that it continued on,” he said. “So, so proud of them. Especially representative of the Republic of Palau.” 

Orrukem said Taiwan offered a unique opportunity. “The training here in Taiwan is a decision to learn different strategies,” he said. “Be the best they can be when they play the game.” 

As the two nations explore new frontiers in sports diplomacy, Orrukem emphasized the long-term value of such programs. “Sports brings the community now into the factor of diplomatic ties,” he said.