Bird flu calls for cross-strait honesty

On Friday, President Chen Shui-bian indicated that he would call a top-level national security meeting to help Taiwan better prepare for the possible outbreak of bird flu. Indeed, as the H5N1 strain of bird flu spreads around Asia and the rest of the world, Taiwan has been lucky in keeping the disease out and should do everything within its power to keep up the good work.

However, as the threat from the disease looms large in neighboring countries and countries further afield, Taiwan, like other members of the international community, should play a more active role in preventing and tackling outbreaks of avian flu.

The biggest threat to Taiwan would be a serious outbreak of bird flu in China. Only on Friday, the World Health Organization asked the Chinese government to confirm whether the death of a 12-year-old girl in Hunan Province was caused by bird flu. The provincial health department indicated that she died from pneumonia. However, press reports from Hong Kong reported the girl's father as saying that his daughter had eaten diseased duck before her death.

Chinese health officials have conceded that there have been outbreaks in five other provinces. There have also been several incidents of large numbers of poultry dying of suspected flu. One such incident took place in a chicken farm near Shanghai, a contrast to the remote rural areas typically associated with the disease.

In view of China's past record in concealing serious outbreaks of disease -- most notably during the SARS crisis -- it is difficult to believe that Beijing will not continue to cover up the truth in order to preserve its international image.

Obviously Beijing knows full well the damage done to its international image by the incompetence it showed in dealing with SARS. So, recently, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao reassured the world that bird flu is under control in his country. Unfortunately, once one's reputation is tarnished, it can be hard to rebuild, especially given reports of Chinese government officials driving away members of Hong Kong's press when they tried to visit sites around China where outbreaks have allegedly occurred.

Even Hong Kong's government is worried about the potential impact on the region should an outbreak get out of control. Taiwan has every reason to be on full alert.

While Chinese officials have insisted that Hong Kong and Taiwan will be quickly notified in the event of an outbreak, one cannot help but wonder how seriously that promise can be taken when politicians from Hong Kong have complained about such measures as being mere window dressing.

In view of the serious health threat posed by the flu to the entire region, Beijing should abandon its past practices and keep both the international community, especially close neighbors such as Taiwan, up to date with news of any outbreak of the disease.

In addition, in view of the nation's continued success in keeping out H5N1, Taiwan should be rewarded by being given the chance to play a greater role in sharing its experiences with other members of the international community.

The true meaning of `retrocession'

By the Liberty Times editorial

`Our children should be taught to remember that whatever else this day represents, it was most certainly not retrocession.'

As China marked the 60th anniversary of Taiwan's recovery from Japan with an unprecedented high-profile celebration, and invited some pro-China groups from Taiwan as examples to support its claim to the nation, it did not forget to bully Taiwan by depriving it of one more diplomatic ally.

On the one hand, Beijing responded to the pan-blue camp through its high-profile celebration of the so-called Retrocession on Oct. 25. But at the same time, it bought Taiwan's diplomatic ally Senegal, in an effort to further undermine the nation's diplomatic efforts and marginalize Taiwan in the international community.

This two-pronged attack, targeting Taiwan on the domestic and international fronts, is designed to destroy the legitimacy of the nation's existence and force it to eventually accept the idea of "one country, two systems."

China has made every effort to oppress and unify Taiwan, and has even forged the history of the "retrocession." It has been repeatedly pointed out that when Japan finally surrendered at the end of World War II in 1945, the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) troops came to Taiwan to accept its surrender under General Douglas MacArthur's General Order No. 1. At that time, all forces north of 16o latitude in Vietnam also surrendered to former president Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石). Therefore, Taiwan was later occupied by -- rather than sovereignty transferred to -- ? the KMT government.

In the 1951 San Francisco Peace Treaty, Japan merely announced an abandonment of its claims on Taiwan. This was the correct thing for the defeated Japan to do in the circumstances. First, the Qing dynasty had ceded Taiwan to Japan in perpetuity after the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895. As a result, the ownership of Taiwan is completely unrelated to China. Next, although Japan was defeated in the war, it was not defeated by China. At that time, most of China was occupied by Japanese troops, and the government only ruled a small area in the country's southwest. As the KMT could hardly protect itself, how was it able to liberate Taiwan from Japan? In other words, the defeat of Japan was a result of US attacks and the two atomic bombs. The retrocession of Taiwan was a result of US actions, and as President Chen Shui-bian has pointed out, it did not constitute a return to China.

The KMT is nothing more -- or less -- than a foreign overlord in Taiwan. The fact that Taiwan was released from Japanese rule had nothing to do with the KMT, and under its dictatorial rule, Taiwan suffered the White Terror and the 228 Incident in which much of its intellectual elite was destroyed. What right does such a government, its hands still covered in Taiwanese blood, have to talk about the retrocession of Taiwan?

The establishment of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1949 set China on a path quite separate from that of Taiwan. The divergent historical development of these two countries China's celebration of Retrocession totally absurd. And as China's leadership, joined by pan-blue politicians, celebrated, China's policy of repression against Taiwan did not soften, even for a moment. Even on the very day of the celebrations, China smilingly announced its coup in depriving Taiwan of a diplomatic ally.

According to Taiwan's ambassador in Senegal, China dangled a carrot of US$200 million, along with assistance in the development of mineral resources and construction of a tunnel beneath the river separating Senegal and Gambia, a deal worth over US$2 billion. China was clearly willing to disregard the cost, clear evidence of what Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade later said: in the pursuit of national interests, there can be no friendships.

Taiwan now only has 25 diplomatic allies, but China is willing to do everything within its power to bring this number down to zero. Taiwan's position has even been undermined in APEC, an economic and commerce forum with no bearing on issues of national sovereignty. Not only is Taiwan's president not allowed to attend, even the compromise solution of sending the legislative speaker has been rejected. But the most tragic thing is that even as China acts in this barbarous way, pan-blue camp politicians still refuse to take Taiwan's side in the argument.

Not only do they not protest, they have also accused the government of incompetence. Oct. 25, 1945, was simply a day on which Taiwan exchanged one tyrannical regime for another. Our children should be taught to remember that whatever else this day represents, it was most certainly not retrocession.