Taiwan would be “very foolish” to view US President Donald Trump as being more favorable than the previous US administration, US academic Francis Fukuyama said yesterday at a public lecture in Taipei.
“From Taiwan’s standpoint, you’d be very foolish to put any trust in him,” he said, calling earlier Trump suggestions of a possible move away from the US’ “one China” policy “a pure tactical calculation.”
“Essentially he was thinking to himself, maybe I can hold ‘one China’ policy hostage in order to get better terms from China in some future negotiation, which means he’s ready to discard Taiwan at the first instance if China offers him a better deal,” he said, adding that support for Taiwan in the US Congress and the Republican Party should prevent a deal with China at Taiwan’s expense.
In the speech sponsored by the Fair Winds Foundation, which was founded by former premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺), Fukuyama talked on the challenges faced by the liberal international order as US power declines and numerous liberal democracies have seen the rise of right-wing populist movements.
Fukuyama dismissed comparisons between the Sunflower movement and right-wing populism.
“The Sunflower movement was a national-identity movement in many respects, but it was not an intolerant kind of aggressive nationalism of the sort that you see in Europe,” he said, linking it instead to traditional left-wing movements throughout Asia.
“The left-wing movements retain an important component of liberalism, because they actually want to maintain open societies.They’re not going to attack the media and they’re not going to create authoritarian political structures,” he said.
The Sunflower movement also lacked the anti-elitism and cult of personality that characterized right-wing populist movements in other countries, he said.
The Sunflower movement refers to student-led protests that began on March 18, 2014, in which students occupied the legislative chamber for almost 23 days to protest the then-Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government’s handling of a proposed cross-strait service trade agreement.
While the economic conditions for a backlash against globalization exist in Asia, populism in the regime has been mainly mobilized by left-wing movement parties, Fukuyama said, citing the relative lack of immigration relative to other developed regions as an important reason for the differing response.
WANG RELEASED: A police investigation showed that an organized crime group allegedly taught their clients how to pretend to be sick during medical exams Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) and 11 others were released on bail yesterday, after being questioned for allegedly dodging compulsory military service or forging documents to help others avoid serving. Wang, 33, was catapulted into stardom for his role in the coming-of-age film Our Times (我的少女時代). Lately, he has been focusing on developing his entertainment career in China. The New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office last month began investigating an organized crime group that is allegedly helping men dodge compulsory military service using falsified documents. Police in New Taipei City Yonghe Precinct at the end of last month arrested the main suspect,
Eleven people, including actor Darren Wang (王大陸), were taken into custody today for questioning regarding the evasion of compulsory military service and document forgery, the New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office said. Eight of the people, including Wang, are suspected of evading military service, while three are suspected of forging medical documents to assist them, the report said. They are all being questioned by police and would later be transferred to the prosecutors’ office for further investigation. Three men surnamed Lee (李), Chang (張) and Lin (林) are suspected of improperly assisting conscripts in changing their military classification from “stand-by
LITTORAL REGIMENTS: The US Marine Corps is transitioning to an ‘island hopping’ strategy to counterattack Beijing’s area denial strategy The US Marine Corps (USMC) has introduced new anti-drone systems to bolster air defense in the Pacific island chain amid growing Chinese military influence in the region, The Telegraph reported on Sunday. The new Marine Air Defense Integrated System (MADIS) Mk 1 is being developed to counter “the growing menace of unmanned aerial systems,” it cited the Marine Corps as saying. China has constructed a powerful defense mechanism in the Pacific Ocean west of the first island chain by deploying weapons such as rockets, submarines and anti-ship missiles — which is part of its anti-access/area denial (A2/AD) strategy against adversaries — the
Former Taiwan People’s Party chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) may apply to visit home following the death of his father this morning, the Taipei Detention Center said. Ko’s father, Ko Cheng-fa (柯承發), passed away at 8:40am today at the Hsinchu branch of National Taiwan University Hospital. He was 94 years old. The center said Ko Wen-je was welcome to apply, but declined to say whether it had already received an application. The center also provides psychological counseling to people in detention as needed, it added, also declining to comment on Ko Wen-je’s mental state. Ko Wen-je is being held in detention as he awaits trial
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