Relations between Taiwan and the Czech Republic have flourished in recent years. However, not everyone is pleased about the growing friendship between the two countries.
Last month, an incident involving a Chinese diplomat tailing the car of vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) in Prague, drew public attention to the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) operations to undermine Taiwan overseas.
The trip was not Hsiao’s first visit to the Central European country. It was meant to be low-key, a chance to meet with local academics and politicians, until her police escort noticed a car was tailing her through the Czech capital.
Photo: Reuters
The driver ran red lights, almost causing an accident at an intersection. When confronted by authorities, he presented a diplomatic passport issued by the PRC, according to the Czech Internet news site Seznam Zpravy. The driver, who works for the Chinese embassy’s military department, denied allegations he was tailing Hsiao.
“Various incidents occur regularly but a car chase through the city, like something out of an action movie, is quite unusual,” says Simona Fantova, a Czech analyst for the China-focused project Sinopsis.
Even though she considers this incident extreme, Chinese interference in national matters is not unheard of. The PRC is regularly mentioned in the annual report of the Czech Security Information Service (BIS), an agency similar to the FBI. Last year’s report explicitly refers to an effort to suppress any cooperation between the Czech Republic and Taiwan.
Photo: AFP
“China has been strongly opposed to any cooperation with Taiwan and has repeatedly responded by issuing official statements in an effort to draw attention to the crossing of so-called red lines. The BIS interprets these statements as an attempt to deter further strengthening of Czech-Taiwan relations,” the agency reports.
A BITTER BREW
The BIS is not alone in its analysis.
“China has long sought to persuade, not only political representatives but also businessmen, journalists and academics of its point of view. The moment this approach fails, intimidation sets in,” says Ivana Karaskova, analyst and founder of China Observers in Central and Eastern Europe (CHOICE).
Two presidents of the Senate have firsthand experience with Chinese intimidation. Jaroslav Kubera was the first to consider visiting Taiwan during his 2019 diplomatic trip to Asia. He was met with criticism from the Chinese embassy as well as from Czech political elites like ex-president Milos Zeman, a longtime supporter of Sino-Czech relations.
Kubera later received an “invitation for tea” at the Chinese embassy, where he met with the Chinese ambassador behind closed doors. The details of the session remain unknown, but evidence of Chinese meddling and threats are seen in a letter from the embassy addressed to him later.
It had a significantly negative impact on him, his wife recalls. Kubera died from a heart attack a few days later. His wife suspects foul play and requested a toxicological autopsy to rule out poisoning. The request was denied.
SMEAR CAMPAIGN
In some cases, PRC intimidation can take the form of smear campaigns, Karaskova adds. Kubera’s successor, the current head of the Parliament Milos Vystrcil, chose to follow in Kubera’s footsteps and visit Taiwan. His 2020 trip was considered a success. He met with President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and president-elect William Lai (賴清德). Economic and cultural exchanges between the two countries have followed.
Soon after, the Czech media received a tip alleging a bribe of US$4 million had been paid to Vystrcil for the visit. After a closer inspection, it turned out that the allegations were part of a clumsy smear campaign linked to PRC operations in Switzerland
“The activity of the Chinese embassy in cooperation with some Czech politicians was truly unprecedented,” Fantova says.
PRAGUE INVESTIGATES
Both cases were heavily documented by the media, and greater attention is now being paid to nefarious Chinese activities in Europe.
“I think that awareness of what China is doing in the Czech Republic has increased significantly in recent years,” Karaskova says.
The Czech police force previously removed Tibetan and Uyghur flags during President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) visit to Prague in 2016. Officers were also alleged to have stood by while Chinese supporters used force to remove Czech demonstrators from a road Xi was on. The police have since been urged to be more diligent with regards to China.
“We as a society are better prepared and more sensitive to these Chinese incidents,” Fantova says.
The Czech government too, is becoming more assertive. Minister of Foreign Affairs Jan Lipavsky spoke privately with the Chinese ambassador Feng Biao (馮?) about the allegation Hsiao Bi-khim’s car was followed by a PRC diplomat but was dissatisfied with the explanation provided. An ongoing investigation may result in the diplomat who drove the car being expelled, which would be the first case involving a PRC official of this kind.
July 1 to July 7 Huang Ching-an (黃慶安) couldn’t help but notice Imelita Masongsong during a company party in the Philippines. With paler skin and more East Asian features, she did not look like the other locals. On top of his job duties, Huang had another mission in the country, given by his mother: to track down his cousin, who was deployed to the Philippines by the Japanese during World War II and never returned. Although it had been more than three decades, the family was still hoping to find him. Perhaps Imelita could provide some clues. Huang never found the cousin;
Once again, we are listening to the government talk about bringing in foreign workers to help local manufacturing. Speaking at an investment summit in Washington DC, the Minister of Economic Affairs, J.W. Kuo (郭智輝), said that the nation must attract about 400,000 to 500,000 skilled foreign workers for high end manufacturing by 2040 to offset the falling population. That’s roughly 15 years from now. Using the lower number, Taiwan would have to import over 25,000 foreigners a year for these positions to reach that goal. The government has no idea what this sounds like to outsiders and to foreigners already living here.
Lines on a map once meant little to India’s Tibetan herders of the high Himalayas, expertly guiding their goats through even the harshest winters to pastures on age-old seasonal routes. That stopped in 2020, after troops from nuclear-armed rivals India and China clashed in bitter hand-to-hand combat in the contested high-altitude border lands of Ladakh. Swaths of grazing lands became demilitarized “buffer zones” to keep rival forces apart. For 57-year-old herder Morup Namgyal, like thousands of other semi-nomadic goat and yak herders from the Changpa pastoralist people, it meant traditional lands were closed off. “The Indian army stops us from going there,” Namgyal said,
A tourist plaque outside the Chenghuang Temple (都城隍廟) lists it as one of the “Top 100 Religious Scenes in Taiwan.” It is easy to see why when you step inside the Main Hall to be confronted with what amounts to an imperial stamp of approval — a dragon-framed, golden protection board gifted to the temple by the Guangxu Emperor that reads, “Protected by Guardians.” Some say the plaque was given to the temple after local prayers to the City God (城隍爺) miraculously ended a drought. Another version of events tells of how the emperor’s son was lost at sea and rescued