With the nation’s attention rightly focused on urgent rescue efforts in the aftermath of Typhoon Morakot last weekend, a couple of notable events that would otherwise have grabbed the headlines slipped under the radar for most people.
The first was comments made on Thursday by Li Fei (李非), deputy director of the Taiwan Research Center at Xiamen University, who was in Taiwan to take part in a cross-strait forum.
Lee said that China’s pushing of cross-strait economic exchanges had three main benefits, one of which was to accelerate unification.
While Lee’s forthright language may be shocking to some given where he was speaking, this is not the first time he has made such comments. On a previous occasion, the Presidential Office was swift to play down the implications of his words, saying that the government would uphold Taiwan’s interests in economic dealings with China.
But despite the Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) administration’s best efforts to skirt discussion of the implications of growing closer to China, Beijing’s views on economic exchanges and the part they play in its unification agenda are plain for all to see.
The second notable event was the launch on Tuesday by the China Times Group of Want Daily (旺報), a newspaper dedicated to covering news from China.
Launching a newspaper that focuses on events in another country is a bizarre concept.
But the launch is even more bizarre considering how the Internet has changed the way readers gather news.
Newspapers that report on domestic affairs are struggling to make money; it is thus difficult to comprehend what makes the China Times Group think that people will spend good money on a publication with its eyes trained on another land — one that many Taiwanese have never been to, nor have the desire to visit.
The launch seems to confirm fears that media specialists expressed when the Want Want Group took control of the China Times Group last year: A business that earns most of its money in China and controls a large portion of the Taiwanese media would use the newspaper as a conduit for pro-China propaganda.
The rationale behind the Want Daily, according to the first issue, is to help Taiwanese “understand” China.
While many in Taiwan understand how a government can turn guns on its own people in order to maintain power — Taiwanese have had that experience, after all — some may not understand why a government would persecute and torture its own people over religious beliefs, or jail activists and silence critics who try to help those suffering at the hands of thuggish officials, as happened in the aftermath of the Sichuan Earthquake.
The only thing that a lot of Taiwanese need to better understand about China is that its government will stop at nothing until Taiwan is brought under its control.
Only impartial, warts-and-all news coverage, not Want Daily puff pieces, will perform this function.
The gutting of Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Asia (RFA) by US President Donald Trump’s administration poses a serious threat to the global voice of freedom, particularly for those living under authoritarian regimes such as China. The US — hailed as the model of liberal democracy — has the moral responsibility to uphold the values it champions. In undermining these institutions, the US risks diminishing its “soft power,” a pivotal pillar of its global influence. VOA Tibetan and RFA Tibetan played an enormous role in promoting the strong image of the US in and outside Tibet. On VOA Tibetan,
Sung Chien-liang (宋建樑), the leader of the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) efforts to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lee Kun-cheng (李坤城), caused a national outrage and drew diplomatic condemnation on Tuesday after he arrived at the New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office dressed in a Nazi uniform. Sung performed a Nazi salute and carried a copy of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf as he arrived to be questioned over allegations of signature forgery in the recall petition. The KMT’s response to the incident has shown a striking lack of contrition and decency. Rather than apologizing and distancing itself from Sung’s actions,
US President Trump weighed into the state of America’s semiconductor manufacturing when he declared, “They [Taiwan] stole it from us. They took it from us, and I don’t blame them. I give them credit.” At a prior White House event President Trump hosted TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家), head of the world’s largest and most advanced chip manufacturer, to announce a commitment to invest US$100 billion in America. The president then shifted his previously critical rhetoric on Taiwan and put off tariffs on its chips. Now we learn that the Trump Administration is conducting a “trade investigation” on semiconductors which
By now, most of Taiwan has heard Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an’s (蔣萬安) threats to initiate a vote of no confidence against the Cabinet. His rationale is that the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)-led government’s investigation into alleged signature forgery in the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) recall campaign constitutes “political persecution.” I sincerely hope he goes through with it. The opposition currently holds a majority in the Legislative Yuan, so the initiation of a no-confidence motion and its passage should be entirely within reach. If Chiang truly believes that the government is overreaching, abusing its power and targeting political opponents — then
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