On Tuesday, Prague Mayor Zdenek Hrib expressed his support for Taiwan on Twitter amid an outbreak of COVID-19 in the nation. In a reference clearly targeted at the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Hrib wrote: “I am appalled that politics is obstructing the delivery of vaccines to Taiwan. Prague supports Taiwan and our sister city Taipei.” Hrib is known to be friendly toward Taiwan, as are some other Czech politicians, including Czech Senate President Milos Vystrcil, who declared “I am a Taiwanese” in the Legislative Yuan in Taipei on Sept. 1 last year.
For that, he was threatened by Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅), and even though Wang, at the time visiting Europe, was subsequently asked to avoid such behavior, there was little pushback from European leaders.
On Wednesday last week, Minister of Foreign Affairs Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) attended a forum organized by the European Values Center for Security Policy in Prague, prompting a complaint from the Chinese embassy in Prague. Czech lawmaker Jakub Janda, the center’s executive director, responded curtly to the complaint on Twitter: “We do not care about your opinion on our event, you will not dictate who our friends & guest are. Taiwan is our ally.”
These are small indications that the worm is turning. If politicians, such as Taiwan’s friends in Prague, are showing their growing distaste for the CCP’s bullying and domineering ways, then so, at long last, are those on the bigger stage of major international forums such as the G7 summit that concluded on Sunday. In the summit’s joint communique, the US and European participants delivered a historic rebuke of China and — significantly — mentioned Taiwan, the first time G7 leaders have done so.
Taiwan’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co in international supply chains, exacerbated by awareness of the need to reorganize and protect them, have contributed to raising the nation’s profile on the global stage.
However, to a large degree, it is the CCP’s threatening behavior and its “wolf warrior diplomacy” that have placed such intense scrutiny on Taiwan as an exemplar of democratic values, and the importance of its geopolitical and technological strategic value for an international community increasingly concerned over China’s rise.
Taiwan has long known the CCP to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing, but Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) has allowed the facade to slip, revealing its true nature to the rest of the world. Xi’s recent urging of officials to soften the party’s image and make it more “trustworthy, lovable and respectable” are remarkable in how blind they are to the degree to which trust in the CCP has deteriorated. If the wolf attempts to drape the wool back over its shoulders, it will look foolish. The world knows what lies beneath.
Prior to the pandemic, Xi was making considerable headway in portraying China and its proposed China-centric international world order as an alternative to the US-led order to which the major European democracies adhered. Especially with former US president Donald Trump pulling out of international alliances, Xi was laying the foundations to depict China as a responsible member of the international community capable of assuming a leading role on issues such as multilateral cooperation, financial stability and global warming. The G7 joint communique signals that this attempt is dead in the water.
It would be naive to think that all was rosy within the EU, and in its relationship with the US, as the bloc is unsure of the US’ ability to continue being a stable and reliable ally, following the stress tests placed on that relationship by Trump’s isolationism. However, the CCP is the fresh mortar holding the shaky edifice together: Xi has given them a common cause.
Taiwan is a small, humble place. There is no Eiffel Tower, no pyramids — no singular attraction that draws the world’s attention. If it makes headlines, it is because China wants to invade. Yet, those who find their way here by some twist of fate often fall in love. If you ask them why, some cite numbers showing it is one of the freest and safest countries in the world. Others talk about something harder to name: The quiet order of queues, the shared umbrellas for anyone caught in the rain, the way people stand so elderly riders can sit, the
Taiwan’s fall would be “a disaster for American interests,” US President Donald Trump’s nominee for undersecretary of defense for policy Elbridge Colby said at his Senate confirmation hearing on Tuesday last week, as he warned of the “dramatic deterioration of military balance” in the western Pacific. The Republic of China (Taiwan) is indeed facing a unique and acute threat from the Chinese Communist Party’s rising military adventurism, which is why Taiwan has been bolstering its defenses. As US Senator Tom Cotton rightly pointed out in the same hearing, “[although] Taiwan’s defense spending is still inadequate ... [it] has been trending upwards
After the coup in Burma in 2021, the country’s decades-long armed conflict escalated into a full-scale war. On one side was the Burmese army; large, well-equipped, and funded by China, supported with weapons, including airplanes and helicopters from China and Russia. On the other side were the pro-democracy forces, composed of countless small ethnic resistance armies. The military junta cut off electricity, phone and cell service, and the Internet in most of the country, leaving resistance forces isolated from the outside world and making it difficult for the various armies to coordinate with one another. Despite being severely outnumbered and
Small and medium enterprises make up the backbone of Taiwan’s economy, yet large corporations such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) play a crucial role in shaping its industrial structure, economic development and global standing. The company reported a record net profit of NT$374.68 billion (US$11.41 billion) for the fourth quarter last year, a 57 percent year-on-year increase, with revenue reaching NT$868.46 billion, a 39 percent increase. Taiwan’s GDP last year was about NT$24.62 trillion, according to the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics, meaning TSMC’s quarterly revenue alone accounted for about 3.5 percent of Taiwan’s GDP last year, with the company’s
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