DPP sticks to its guns over Lee's remarks on ROC

 

FINE LINE: The party said it was the opposition and China that wanted to get rid of both the Republic of China and Taiwan under the `one China' principle

 

By Lin Chieh-yu

STAFF REPORTER

 

The DPP yesterday continued to defend former president Lee Teng-hui's remark that "the Republic of China does not exist anymore," saying that Beijing and the opposition parties here want to make both the ROC and Taiwan disappear in accordance with the "one China" principle.

 

The DPP also asked those who do not agree with Lee to consult international leaders about the issue.

 

"KMT Chairman Lien Chan wanted President Chen Shui-bian to respond to the question of whether or not the ROC exists. Lien should first ask [China's former president] Jiang Zemin, [current president] Hu Jintao and Kofi Annan [secretary-general] of the UN whether the ROC exists or not," said Yang Meng-hsun, head of the DPP's culture and information department.

 

Following Lee's statement about the ROC last Saturday, the DPP decided, after internal discussions, to respond with respect and understanding, a source from the party said.

 

"We suggest that the top leadership of the party and government do not need to respond. A response could only heat up this sensitive issue," the source, who wanted to remain anonymous, said.

 

"It is difficult for the heads of government and the DPP, being the ruling party, to say that the ROC does not exist. They have to avoid creating more controversy with a bad response," the source said.

 

However, middle-ranking officials of the DPP stood on the front line to debate with opposition parties.

 

Cheng Wen-tsan, deputy director of the DPP's culture and information department, said the DPP will not shy away from the sovereignty issue in the coming presidential election. The party will still use "one country on each side" of the Taiwan Strait as a campaign keynote.

 

All discourse regarding Taiwan's future will be built on the party's "Resolution Regarding Taiwan's Future" passed in 1999, Chen's 2000 inaugural speech and the principle of "one country on each side," Cheng said.

 

According to Cheng, neither the ROC nor Taiwan exists in a "one China" framework. China's representation issue has been very much set in the international community since the ROC quit the UN. Now the ROC that represents China no longer exists -- the ROC is now on the island of Taiwan, Cheng said.

 

Cheng said Lee's remarks were grounded in an in-depth reflection and description of Taiwan's diplomatic situation during his 12 years in power.

 

Meanwhile, the DPP's legislative caucus yesterday refused to comment further on Lee's remarks and stressed that the former president has the freedom to express his opinions and that the DPP caucus respects his remarks.

 

"The DPP's position on this issue is clear: Taiwan is a sovereign country, and its name is the Republic of China," said Chen Chi-mai, leader of the DPP's legislative caucus.

 

 

China dreaming

 

To think of China as one entity is like thinking of the European continent as a permanent territory of the Roman empire ("The games big powers play," Aug. 18, page 8).

 

In the past 100 years, control of China has changed hands at least four times. From the Qing Dynasty to the KMT, to the warlords, to the KMT again, then the communists, with some Japanese occupation in between. To say the communists will last 100 years in China is taken for granted.

As for the past 1,000 years, China has conveniently considered all the "foreigners" who invaded or conquered China as "Chinese." They even want to include Pacific Islanders, such as Taiwanese, as "Chinese," even though they were only associated with China for a brief few decades over thousands of years of history.

 

Some people think if you are 1 percent black you are black. Chinese think if you are 1 percent Chinese you are Chinese, like it or not. The only major ethnic groups in the world not included are perhaps white Caucasian and African.

 

Out of the five major ethnic groups China claims, Mongolians have secured independence and those living in Islamic East Turkestan and Tibet are kept in China by force. Sadly, the US has recently been collaborating with the Chinese to keep these ethnic groups suppressed.

 

The unprecedented advances in ideology and technology in the 20th century are behind the formation of the big powers. Without these catalysts, the US would not be the superpower it is today. Knowing that, what is a bankrupt ideology such as communism doing playing a big-power game?

 

China's adventurism in the Taiwan Strait can only hasten its own demise, rather than boost its power, imaginary or real. Its flimsy ethnic and imperial claims to Taiwan are as ridiculous as the old Chinese claim of the emperor "son of heaven," foreign or domestic, having the right to conquer and "unite" the country. Were it not for its crony in Taiwan, the KMT, this claim would be worth nothing.

 

As for many developing countries, the best course for China is moderation. Balance between social welfare and capitalism is the key. Modern powers have already succeeded in this. The US has done this, even the inventor of communism, the Germans, have attained this balance. Can China be the exception?

 

China will have to change. It will have to share power internally, not just among party members but among the masses. It will also have to consider democracy. For now, all the powers in the world, including France and the US, are using Taiwan to gain leverage over China. Why complain about Taiwan's purchases of weapons?

 

As the saying goes, democracies never go to war against each other. If China learns that and adopts democracy, perhaps it will become a power to be reckoned with. Why not? To do otherwise would be to its detriment and would ensure that China's dreams of becoming a great power will remain just dreams.

 

Chen Ming-chung

Chicago

 

 

Economic might deadlier than arms

 

During a recent symposium on regional strategy sponsored by the Heritage Foundation of the US, Japan's Okazaki Institute and the Taiwan Thinktank, former Japanese ambassador to the US Hisahiko Okazaki warned that if China gobbles up Taiwan, it will control shipping routes in the West Pacific and South China Sea, thereby challenging US dominance and threatening the strategic positions of the US and Japan in the region.

 

Okazaki was spot on about the strategic and security significance of China's expansion, but he didn't go far enough. China's economic expansion may be a more important variable in strategic relations in the western Pacific and the rest of the world than its military expansion.

 

The Asian Wall Street Journal said in a front-page report on July 31 that China's expanding economic and trading power is not only giving both developing and developed countries a headache, but also giving rise to questions in the US such as "How can a tax cut help our economy when it will be spent in stores importing goods mainly from China?" Businessweek magazine has also reported that a massive inflow of low-price Chinese products is crowding out both US-made products and those from other countries.

 

Japanese products have long been known for their high quality and pricing. After more than a decade of economic malaise, Japan's markets are now filled with cheap products from China. Many small and medium-sized businesses in Japan have been forced to invest and manufacture in China. The capital and technology drain to China has not only compounded the Japanese economy's downturn, but has also made the country increasingly dependent on China. It has also worsened deflation in Japan. Both the US and Japan are feeling the heat of China's economic fever.

Taiwan has also suffered a great outflow of capital and skilled personnel to China. It is also trying to get out of the vortex of the Chinese economy.

 

If China had a free economy and if it had been selling its products throughout the world based on competitive pricing, no one could have any objections. China's economic power, however, has been built by sacrificing human rights, freedom, democracy and the environment. Even though China is a member of the WTO, it has not implemented many of the WTO's rules. Many WTO rules covering fair competition are simply sidelined by Beijing. This is a case of unfair competition. The expansion of such an economic power is worrying.

 

Since China's military expansion is more visible, one can defend against it by setting up various security mechanisms. However, the pressure of China's gradually growing economic power can kill those who are not perceptive, just as slowly heating a pot of water kills a frog placed inside it. If no forethought is given and no prevention made today, one will regret tomorrow.

 

The US, Japan and Taiwan have cooperative mechanisms on regional security issues, but on economic security, the three countries have similar problems and yet lack channels to jointly solve them. The three countries should set up joint discussion channels to strengthen their economic cooperation and work toward a US-Japan-Taiwan free trade area. If official channels cannot be established, then a mechanism such as trilateral strategic talks should be immediately expanded to include economics. Economics can no longer be excluded from regional security concerns.

 

Ethnic tensions simmer in Tibet's boomtown

 

TOURISM: While a crowd of patrons party the night away at the Longyu Nightclub, many Tibetans fear the influx of money and migrants could erode the country's culture

 

AP , TSETANG, TIBET

 

"Over the past couple of years we've really seen a lot of new people come in. I think that's really great to further our future here."－Wen Qing, Longyu Nightclub owner

 

A Bollywood wannabe in a sequined suit is shaking his hips on stage. In the audience, Chinese businessmen crack open cans of Budweiser and half-drunken Tibetan truck drivers look for dance partners.

 

It's a Friday night in Tsetang, Tibet's third-largest city, and times have never been so good -- at least for patrons of the Longyu Nightclub, where the crowd starts to swell only after midnight.

 

"Over the past couple of years we've really seen a lot of new people come in. I think that's really great to further our future here," says Wen Qing, 33, the club's half-Chinese, half-Tibetan owner.

 

Like much of southern Tibet, Tsetang is booming. New buildings are rising as Chinese migrants stream in. Many are drawn by the chance to buy and sell, by higher salaries or by other government policies aimed at attracting skilled workers to the area.

 

Yet not all share in the new prosperity. Tibet's complicated political and ethnic issues remain just below the surface, ignored for now but still a potential source of future tension.

 

Many Tibetans, especially those in exile, fear the money and newcomers could erode Tibet's unique, once highly insular culture, already battered by decades of political upheaval and strong Communist Party control over its key Buddhist institutions.

 

Tsetang, like many other Tibetan towns, already resembles thousands of Chinese provincial towns with their faceless low-rise shop houses and nondescript office buildings of cream tile and blue-tinted glass.

Prostitution is practiced openly in dozens of tiny shopfronts with names like "Barbie Doll Hair Salon." Chinese women speaking in Sichuan accents call out to customers from doorways lit by lurid pink fluorescent lights and rush to the curb when drivers pull up in their trucks.

 

Advertisements are almost entirely in Chinese, while shop signs feature Tibetan only in small print above large, usually red, Chinese characters. On the outskirts of Xigaze, Tibet's second-largest city and the traditional home of one of its most prominent lamas, cookie-cutter mansions are springing up on the outskirts and help-wanted signs appear only in Chinese.

A Tibetan yak on Mount Kmali, south of capital Lhasa Saturday, overlooking lake Yanshuoyong which is now turned into a popular tourist attraction. Chinese officials in Tibet have voiced doubts that the exiled Dalai Lama would help boost the already thriving tourism industry in the Himalayan region if he were allowed to return, as a million tourists are expected to arrive in Tibet in 2003, with revenues equalling up to one billion yuan (US$120 million).