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Sympathy should not blur legal boundaries

By Ji Shun-jie

A colleague of mine was very angry after hearing that the families of several Chinese women who had drowned in the Taiwan Strait while trying to be smuggled into Taiwan had asked for compensation from our government. After discussing the issue with my colleague, I believe there are some ideas about right and wrong that I should present as reference for the public, especially media workers and politicians.

First, do illegal immigrants have human rights? As human beings, they should, of course, enjoy human rights. But they are also criminals, and alien criminals to boot.

Our government should shoulder responsibility for humanitarian aid in the face of disaster. The human rights of criminals abide in the question of whether they are treated reasonably and legally during the process of arrest, interrogation and trial. Let's suppose a criminal tries to escape a police pursuit by speeding away in a car, and dies in a crash. The criminal's family won't be able to have the police take responsibility for compensation.

The line between humanitarianism and law should be very clear. Law enforcement personnel should not shoulder irrelevant responsibility for enforcing the law. The traditional habit of emphasizing compatibility with "emotions, reason and the law" is a major impingement on the rule of law. Interference with the law by the instigation of emotions should be condemned.

Some people compared the event to the Qiandao Lake incident [24 Taiwanese tourists and eight Chinese boat crew and guides were robbed and murdered while on a cruise of Qiandao Lake, Zhejiang Province, in March 1994] and believed that we should use China's attitude and handling of that incident to defend our government's position.

This comparison is wrong. The victims at Qiandao Lake were tourists, not illegal immigrants. Such a comparison is very disrespectful to the Qiandao victims, as well as incompatible with legal reasoning.

What is right and what is wrong in this issue have become confused primarily because of the relations between the two sides of the Strait. Both the media and political forces want to use the issue to achieve their own goals. The charge of rights-violation is merely another excuse for attacking the government.

The opposition forces will not let go of an opportunity to make the ruling party look bad. But they should not forget the importance of national sovereignty and dig-nity. If some illegal Taiwanese immigrants were to drown while trying to reach the US, would the US media and politicians sympathize with them and demand compensation from Washington? Of course not. They would condemn those who violate the law and their accomplices.

A simple incident has become complicated because of the fight between the two sides of the Strait. The domestic political wrangling triggered by the cross-strait struggle has also confused the simple legal questions. I hope that people will be able to distinguish between human rights, law and politics. I also hope they can put the country's interests first.

The Americans are able to dominate the world because they put national interests ahead of personal and partisan interests.

That some people inside Taiwan use external forces to bully their political adversaries is a serious accusation to make. I do not wish to make such an association, but in fact we have heard too often that our people give primary consideration to the China's position on every issue, forgetting our national interests. We can view China's position and response as one of our many considerations, but not as the supreme guiding principle for all our policies and actions.

Ji Shun-jie is an assistant professor at Tamkang University's Graduate Institute of Future Studies.

Lawmaker seeks historic change

PHOTO FICTION: A TSU legislator says that a photograph of the Cairo Conference misrepresents what really happened and wants history books to tell the truth

By Fiona Lu

STAFF REPORTER

The photograph of the Cairo Conference is one of the most famous photographs of the Allies' wartime leaders: British prime minister Winston Churchill, US president Franklin Roosevelt and ROC Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek -- along with his wife Madame Chiang.

But one lawmaker says the famed photo is a work of fiction and its use in historical textbooks could be misleading Taiwanese students about the reality of the Cairo Declaration.

"The photo, provided by Madam Chiang, had been used in every textbook of history for 50 years to illustrate the existence of the three leaders' historic meeting in Cairo. The truth is, however, that neither the leaders nor the generalissimo's wife was in Cairo when the so-called Cairo Declaration was first unveiled on Dec. 1, 1943," said Taiwan Solidarity Union Legislator Lo Chih-ming at a public hearing yesterday.

Lo urged that the National Institute for Compilation and Translation -- the government body responsible for supervising and approving school textbooks -- should correct caption that goes with the photograph because, he says, it misleads people into thinking that it was taken in Cairo during the trilateral meeting.

But Lo did not know where the picture had been taken and officials from the institute said they have yet to check on exactly where the trilateral meeting did take place.

In December 1943, the "Three Great Powers" -- Britain, the US and the Republic of China -- released what has since been called the Cairo Declaration. The communique, although unsigned, expressed their common intent to restrain and punish Japan for its aggression. It also said that "all the territories Japan has stolen from the Chinese, such as Manchuria, Formosa, and the Pescadores, shall be restored to the Republic of China."

At the hearing yesterday, Lo charged that the compilation and translation institute had given improper stress and context to the Cairo meeting -- and the Cairo declaration -- when producing the history textbooks used in schools. He noted that many people disagree with the textbooks' interpretation that the declaration legitimized the Chinese Nationalist Party's claim to have recovered sovereignty over Taiwan in 1945.

Lo said that he held the hearing yesterday to hear scholarly opinions on the legitimacy of the Cairo Declaration and its applicability when interpreting Taiwan's international status.

Yang Kuo-yang was the the only person from the compilation and translation institute present at the hearing. Yang acknowledged that further checks were necessary to clarify the caption on the controversial photo. But he emphasized that clarifying the truth of history was beyond the jurisdiction of his institute.

One speaker, Sim Kian-tek, denied the idea that the Cairo Declaration determined Taiwan's status. He also asserted there were problems with the legitimacy and legality of the declaration.

"The so-called declaration was initially a press communique," he said. "And despite the fact that the English newspaper, The Times, reported the release of the press communique from Cairo on Dec. 1, 1943, none of the three leaders were in the Egyptian capital when it was issued.

Roosevelt and Churchill were in Tehran to sign a pact with Soviet leader Josef Stalin when the historical document was released, while Generalissimo Chiang and his wife stayed in China, Sim said.

"A press communique without the leaders' signatures and without their presence at the time of the release should not be counted as legitimate. The discussion of Taiwan's international status cannot be based upon a debatable declaration," said Sim, a former business management professor who in 1993 shifted his focus to the legal study of Taiwan's international status.

But Sim's assertion conflicted with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' interpretation that the Cairo Declaration created, with the three leaders' approval, the legal and legitimate basis for Taiwan's transfer from Japan's to the ROC.

Deputy foreign minister Michael Kuo, gave his view that -- legally speaking -- the Cairo Declaration had problems because of its lack of completeness and the absence of the leaders' signatures.

However, in the world of politics, the intent and legitimacy of the declaration is internationally recognized, Kuo said.

China censors Clinton book

AP , BEIJING

The Chinese call it a matter of mere "technical changes." US Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton calls it censorship. Her American publisher calls it breach of contract and wants it fixed -- now.

The former first lady pronounced herself "amazed and outraged" Wednesday that politically sensitive material had been rewritten or removed from the Chinese-language version of her memoir, without the knowledge of her or her US publisher, Simon & Schuster.

The 466-page Chinese edition of Living History -- a best seller -- does not contain Clinton's comments about the 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy protests. A segment about Chinese-American human rights activist Harry Wu is reduced to almost nothing and refers to him as a spy awaiting sentencing.

At least eight other segments were changed or deleted.

"Unbelievable!" the New York senator said outside a Senate hearing in Washington on Wednesday morning.

Asked why she thought the censorship occurred, Clinton replied: "Why does any government keep information? They want to control the opinions and minds of their people." She called such an attempt "increasingly futile" in the Internet era.

They're certainly not hurting its sales. Living History is on at least its fourth printing since the memoir was released in China on Aug. 3. More than 200,000 copies have been printed, and bookstores in Beijing report brisk sales.

Simon & Schuster, the book's US publisher, has informed the Chinese publisher that its actions are a breach of contract, it said in a statement on Wednesday.

"Yilin Press represented their edition to be a complete and accurate translation of the English text. In fact, numerous changes and deletions were made to portions of the text dealing with Senator Clinton's views about China and her travels there," the publisher said.

Yesterday was supposed to be the day that Tai-wanese cargo planes could start flying between Taiwan and Shanghai, with only brief stopovers in either Macau or Hong Kong. This could have been a noteworthy milestone in cross-strait relations. However, despite the enormous profits to be had from running such a service and their previous enthusiasm, the response of Taiwan's air carriers was lukewarm -- none have applied to operate the route. Key to all this was of course the attitude of the Chinese government, which threw cold water on Taiwan's plans in a press conference held by its Taiwan Affairs Office on Sept. 11.

During the press conference, Pu Zhaozhou, director of the Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau Office under the Civil Aviation Administration of China, repeatedly emphasized that any direct links must be regarded as the "domestic affairs of one country" and be conducted on a "mutually-beneficial, bilateral and direct-flight basis."

The statement immediately negated whatever progress that may have been made in realizing direct links. Beijing's insistence on treating cross-strait links as a domestic affair is precisely what caused the standoff in the first place. After all, agreeing to this would be conceding the existence of "one China" in which Taiwan is merely a province. Beijing's insistence on the "one China" principle as a basis for any and all cross-strait negotiations and interactions has been the primary roadblock to the relationship between the two sides.

Taiwan's attitude, in contrast, has been much more flexible, pragmatic and innovative in trying to improve the cross-strait relationship while side-stepping the thorny issue of the "one China" principle. Premier Yu Shyi-kun reiterated this stance last Saturday by saying that Taiwan had done all that was within its power to launch the new cargo route, because issues such as "bilateral direct flights" and even the "one China" principle could all be discussed once the two sides sat down for negotiations.

Such negotiations, however, are not likely to happen any time soon, since apparently Beijing won't budge from its stance.

The government is right to take incremental steps toward full-scale direct links. Between Taiwan and China, who has more to fear from the other? Surely, no one could disagree that it is Taiwan. Under the circumstances, conservatism on the part of the government is definitely a virtue. It is too risky to directly head for full-scale direct cross-strait links, as suggested by Beijing. Shipments by Taiwanese carriers to Shanghai would at least be a start that could lead to a larger scale opening in the future.

Moreover, one cannot help but wonder about Beijing's reasons for protesting Taiwan's plans for a new cargo route. After all, Taiwan had been the one who demanded government-to-government negotiations from the beginning as a show of its sovereignty, while Beijing insisted that negotiations between private groups on the two sides would suffice for such a "domestic affair." Well, if we follow Beijing's line of reasoning, then nothing would seem to reinforce the existence of "one China" more than the fact that a new cross-strait link, such as the one in question, can be launched without any negotiation whatsoever!

What this all boils down to is that Beijing simply does not want to give President Chen Shui-bian the opportunity to claim credit for any improvement in the cross-strait relationship right before the presidential election. After all, comparing Chen and the joint ticket of Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Lien Chan and People First Party Chairman James Soong, there is very little reason for Beijing to prefer Chen.

As for Chen, he has nothing to lose from this episode -- since he has every reason to now argue that Beijing is the one being uncooperative when it comes to cross-strait relations.

The 5th WTO Ministerial Confer-ence ended in Cancun, Mexico on Sept. 14. The five-day gathering had a significant meaning to us, as Taiwan participated in such an event as an official member for the very first time.

It has been almost two years since the 4th WTO Ministerial Conference in Doha, Qatar agreed in 2001 to start a new round of talks. However, the progress of many of the much-anticipated talks was not as successful as expected. Of course, there can be various explanations for such a negotiation process. But most of them are closely related to both "old politics" and "new characteristics" in the latest round of talks.

"Old politics" refers to the fact that even in the relatively simpler multilateral economic and trade talks in the past, each economy has tried all means at its disposal to obtain its ultimate interests by using its political and economic resources. Hence, "great power politics," "group politics" and official or unofficial alliances often take place during negotiations, while political struggles among different countries and groups seem inevitable. These old phenomena also occurred in this round of talks. Most obviously, both the US and the EU were still playing the role of superpowers in the Cancun talks, and had political fights with each other on issues favorable to them.

In terms of political groups and alliances, a group of core WTO members formed by both developed and developing countries is gradually having their impact on talks. These nations include developed countries, such as Australia, Canada, Japan and New Zealand and developing countries such as Brazil, China India,Chile, Mexico, Malaysia and Thailand as well as Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

In addition, official and unofficial multinational groups and alliances were constantly being formed in the latest round of talks. These groups and alliances were quite flexible. They could be issue or regional-oriented, or be divided according to the degrees of their development. Apart from functioning as platforms for information-gathering and circulation, they are places where ideas come up, and often propose various suggestions that are able to advance, restrain or even block negotiations.

Despite the old political phenomena, a number of new characteristics or trends were also produced in this round of talks.

First, there was the active participation of developing countries, including poorly-developed countries. Apart from their aggressive applications to the world trade body, they also participated in multilateral talks more frequently, trying to form alliances or cooperate with one another on many issues in order to gain benefits. Perhaps this situation also matches the name of the talks -- the Doha Development Agenda, scheduled to be completed next year and to be implemented in 2005.

Second, the rise of negotiation groupism. As the total number of WTO members grows sharply, one-on-one or one-on-many talks seem infeasible. Developing countries are actively involved in WTO activities, while negotiation topics have gradually become more complex and diverse, involving the domestic political and economic situation of each member. Even a politically and economically great power can hardly dominate or control talks results today.

Therefore, cooperating with one another through alliances or groups to expand influence and ensure shared interests has become the new trend for talks. Besides, since the WTO works by consensus, it is difficult for those who act alone to reach a consensus with others.

Third, the traditional North-South problem and the antipathy between developed and developing countries have appeared in the WTO's operations. As a result, although the Doha Development Agenda was supported by the previous WTO ministerial conference, members could hardly reach a consensus on or purposely ignore development-related issues, or issues that involve either special or differential treatment.

Finally, many issues at the Cancun talks involved non-customs duty barriers. Such talks may be easily affected by domestic political or other forces. Since these issues involve the redistribution of domestic social and economic interests, power politics and diplomatic wrestling cannot control the results anymore, as the WTO's negotiation mode is becoming more and more like business negotiation these days. In other words, the WTO talks are about figures, and certainly about money.

In the face of the political struggles and characteristics of the latest round of talks, apart from appropriately responding to the possible impact on the nation's industries, Taiwan should realize that the WTO is also an arena for diplomatic wrestling and exchanges of benefits. It should cooperate with others when proposing issues, in order to give full play to its own strength. It should also be particular about trifles in order to strive for its own interests. After all, Taiwan is already one of the makers of WTO regulations and no longer just an observer.

Johnny Chiang is an associate professor in the department of political science at Soochow University.