While happy to see both sides of the Taiwan Strait developing better relations under President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration, former American Institute in Taiwan chairman Richard Bush said yesterday that the government should not damage Taiwan’s long-term interests.
Bush, now the director of the Brookings Institution’s Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies (NCAPS), made the remarks during a conference on cross-strait political and economic relations and the next US administration organized by NCAPS in Taipei.
“Washington’s main goal has been the maintenance of peace and prosperity in the Taiwan Strait,” he said.
Bush praised Ma’s attempt to downplay the more hostile position that former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) Democratic Progressive Party government had taken toward China.
While there was distrust and fear on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, it was a good thing that “the two adversaries are breaking away from the mutual distrust,” Bush said.
However, it may be risky for the two sides to “do it all at once,” he said.
“Taiwan must be careful with sovereignty issues,” he said. “When putting aside the sovereignty issue, you must be careful not to damage Taiwan’s long-term interests.”
The Ma administration has made it a policy to put aside the sovereignty issue in its cross-strait negotiations with Beijing.
Bush said he was aware that not everybody in Taiwan was happy about closer ties with China, and that the government should try to bridge the political divide.
Richard Hu (胡偉星), an associate professor at University of Hong Kong’s department of politics and public administration, agreed.
“Instead of one Taiwan, one China, or two Chinas, there are actually one China and two Taiwans,” Hu said. “There’s a pan-blue Taiwan and a pan-green Taiwan — how will China face the two Taiwans?”
Although supporting cross-strait peace and development, Hu said he would advise Ma to “start from simple things, work to build trust” between Taiwan and China first, “then move to something more complicated.”
Brookings president Strobe Talbott said the next US administration would support the idea of giving Taiwan more international space.
Talbott said there would be continuity in Washington’s Taiwan Strait policy.
He said Taiwan should be allowed to participate in the international community because the world of today was much more complicated than in the past and countries are more interdependent.
“Taiwan is part of the international community and has contributed to the international community,” Talbott said, citing Taiwan’s presence in the WTO and its contributions in medicine and public health.
The next US admininstration will support “the concept of giving more international space to Taiwan,” said Talbott, who served as deputy secretary of state under former US president Bill Clinton and has been mentioned as a possible appointee in the new government.
Talbott said Washington’s Taiwan Strait policy would continue to be based on the “one China” policy, the three communiques and the Taiwan Relations Act.
“The United States’ commitment to peace, stability, and a non-confrontation approach in cross-strait matters has no changes whatsoever,” Talbott said.
“I would say that president-elect [Barack] Obama will continue the previous US policy in the Asia region. You can count on it,” Talbott said.
ADDTIONAL REPORTING BY CNA
TENSIONS: The Chinese aircraft and vessels were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a joint air and sea military exercise, the Ministry of National Defense said A relatively large number of Chinese military aircraft and vessels were detected in Taiwan’s vicinity yesterday morning, apparently en route to a Chinese military exercise in the western Pacific, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. In a statement, the ministry said 36 Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) aircraft, including J-16 fighters and nuclear-capable H-6 bombers, crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait or an extension of it, and were detected in the southern and southeastern parts of Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ) from 5:20am to 9:30am yesterday. They were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a
Honor guards are to stop performing changing of the guard ceremonies around a statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) to avoid “worshiping authoritarianism,” the Ministry of Culture said yesterday. The fate of the bronze statue has long been the subject of fierce and polarizing debate in Taiwan, which has transformed from an autocracy under Chiang into one of Asia’s most vibrant democracies. The changing of the guard each hour at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei is a major tourist attraction, but starting from 9am on Monday, the ceremony is to be moved outdoors to Democracy Boulevard, outside the eponymous blue-and-white memorial
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) supports peaceful unification with China, and President William Lai (賴清德) is “a bit naive” for being a “practical worker for Taiwanese independence,” former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in an interview published yesterday. Asked about whether the KMT is on the same page as the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on the issue of Taiwanese independence or unification with China, Ma told the Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper Sin Chew Daily that they are not. While the KMT supports peaceful unification and is against unification by force, the DPP opposes unification as such and
CASES SLOWING: Although weekly COVID-19 cases are rising, the growth rate has been falling, from 90 percent to 30 percent, 14 percent and 6 percent, the CDC said COVID-19 hospitalizations last week rose 6 percent to 987, while deaths soared 55 percent to 99, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, adding that the recent wave of infections would likely peak this week. People aged 65 or older accounted for 79 percent of the hospitalizations and 90 percent of the deaths, the majority of whom have or had underlying health conditions, CDC data showed. The youngest hospitalized case last week was a six-month-old, who was born preterm and was unvaccinated, CDC physician Lin Yung-ching (林詠青) said. The infant had a fever, coughing and a runny nose early this month, but