It has recently been suggested that Taiwan should sign a “peace agreement” with China in the belief it will help reduce tensions in the Taiwan Strait. In general, the term “peace agreement” refers to anything aimed at bringing an end to a bloody conflict such as an armistice signed by warring states, a ceasefire agreement between two sides in a civil war or methods to resolve a border dispute with a neighboring nation. Not one of the 192 member nations of the UN has signed any form of “peace agreement” with Taiwan and yet still somehow manage to peacefully coexist with Taiwan. The one exception is of course China.
Nobody believes that the problems between Taiwan and China are the result of Taiwan encroaching on China. The Taiwanese government gave up on its ridiculous national policy of “reconquering the Mainland” long ago and officially abrogated the Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of National Mobilization for Suppression of the Communist Rebellion (動員戡亂時期臨時條款) in 1991. Since then, Taiwan has demonstrated goodwill toward China by conducting business and investing large amounts of money in the country, so much so that it sometimes comes across as trying to curry favor with China.
In other words, the tensions in the Taiwan Strait are a direct result of the threat China poses to Taiwan, a nation over which it has never held sovereignty. At present, China has more than 1,000 missiles pointing at Taiwan, a number that continues to increase. China has even promulgated an “Anti-Secession” Law that is nothing more than a blatant attempt to legitimize its claims to sovereignty over Taiwan and a legal fig-leaf for widespread efforts to exclude Taiwan from the international arena.
In the event of a kidnapping, the situation is resolved when the kidnapper releases the victim unconditionally, there is no question of both sides negotiating or signing an agreement. If the kidnapper insists on “negotiating,” he or she does so to extort a ransom and the victim is expected to pay a price for freedom. This is a perfect metaphor for the nature of cross-strait relations, with China threatening Taiwan. In truth, all that is required to secure lasting peace in the Taiwan Strait is for China to renounce the use of military force against Taiwan. There is no need for China to keep pretending that “peace talks” are necessary.
China supports “peace talks” because these are the perfect way to force Taiwan to pay a price — whether belittling its nationhood or forcing it to concede sovereignty.
What Taiwan should do is openly call China on its misdeeds in front of the international community. It is important to stand up and explain how China breaches the principles of freedom, democracy, self determination and human rights and the extent to which it acts in ways that run counter to the UN Charter and the norms of international law.
The government must demand that China behave like a modern and civilized nation and respect the sovereignty of Taiwanese. To recklessly enter into “peace talks” with China would be to walk into a trap.
We must never forget that in 1951, Tibet signed a “peace agreement” with Beijing that is similar in form to “one country, two systems.” Within a decade, the People’s Liberation Army had occupied the country and butchered countless people. Since then China has moved huge numbers of Han Chinese into Tibet, so that Tibetans are now a minority in their own country. Tibet’s tragic fate at the hands of China is something that Taiwanese cannot afford to forget.
Peng Ming-min is a former presidential adviser.
TRANSLATED BY DREW CAMERON
US aerospace company Boeing Co has in recent years been involved in numerous safety incidents, including crashes of its 737 Max airliners, which have caused widespread concern about the company’s safety record. It has recently come to light that titanium jet engine parts used by Boeing and its European competitor Airbus SE were sold with falsified documentation. The source of the titanium used in these parts has been traced back to an unknown Chinese company. It is clear that China is trying to sneak questionable titanium materials into the supply chain and use any ensuing problems as an opportunity to
It’s not every month that the US Department of State sends two deputy assistant secretary-level officials to Taiwan, together. Its rarer still that such senior State Department policy officers, once on the ground in Taipei, make a point of huddling with fellow diplomats from “like-minded” NATO, ANZUS and Japanese governments to coordinate their multilateral Taiwan policies. The State Department issued a press release on June 22 admitting that the two American “representatives” had “hosted consultations in Taipei” with their counterparts from the “Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs.” The consultations were blandly dubbed the “US-Taiwan Working Group on International Organizations.” The State
The Chinese Supreme People’s Court and other government agencies released new legal guidelines criminalizing “Taiwan independence diehard separatists.” While mostly symbolic — the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has never had jurisdiction over Taiwan — Tamkang University Graduate Institute of China Studies associate professor Chang Wu-ueh (張五岳), an expert on cross-strait relations, said: “They aim to explain domestically how they are countering ‘Taiwan independence,’ they aim to declare internationally their claimed jurisdiction over Taiwan and they aim to deter Taiwanese.” Analysts do not know for sure why Beijing is propagating these guidelines now. Under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), deciphering the
Many local news media last week reported that COVID-19 is back, citing doctors’ observations and the Centers for Disease Control’s (CDC) statistics. The CDC said that cases would peak this month and urged people to take preventive measures. Although COVID-19 has never been eliminated, it has become more manageable, and restrictions were dropped, enabling people to return to their normal way of life due to decreasing hospitalizations and deaths. In Taiwan, mandatory reporting of confirmed cases and home isolation ended in March last year, while the mask mandate at hospitals and healthcare facilities stopped in May. However, the CDC last week said the number