US warns Pyongyang amid reports of new rocket launch
　

NUCLEAR BRINKMANSHIP: Experts say that the long-range missile North Korea may be on the brink of launching has a range of 6,700km, long enough to reach Alaska

AP, PANMUNJOM, SOUTH KOREA
Sunday, May 31, 2009, Page 1

Spy satellites have spotted signs that North Korea may be preparing to transport another long-range missile to a test launch site, South Korean officials said yesterday, as the US secretary of defense issued his harshest warning to the North since its recent nuclear test.

“We will not stand idly by as North Korea builds the capability to wreak destruction on any target in Asia — or on us,” US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told a regional defense meeting in Singapore.

He said North Korea’s nuclear program was a “harbinger of a dark future,” but wasn’t yet a direct threat.

Since last Monday’s nuclear blast, North Korea has test-launched six short-range missiles in a show of force and announced it won’t honor the 1953 truce that ended the fighting in the Korean War.

Now, the reclusive communist state appears to be preparing to move a long-range missile by train from a weapons factory near Pyongyang to its northeastern Musudan-ni launch pad, a South Korean defense ministry official said.

Images of the movements were captured by US satellites, said the official, who was not allowed to be identified when discussing intelligence matters.

The threat of a long-range missile test comes amid heightened tensions over North Korea’s nuclear program.

North Korea, believed to have enough weaponized plutonium for at least six nuclear bombs, walked away from international disarmament negotiations last month in anger over UN criticism of a rocket launch Washington and others called a cover for the test of long-range missile technology.

Experts say Pyongyang is working toward mounting a nuclear bomb on a long-range missile, one capable of reaching the US.

Gates and the defense ministers of Japan and South Korea said North Korea must not be allowed to continue playing a dangerous game of brinksmanship in hopes of winning aid.

“We must make North Korea clearly recognize that it will not be rewarded for its wrong behaviors,” South Korea Defense Minister Lee Sang-hee said.

Officials in Washington said they noticed increased activity at the test site. They spoke on condition of anonymity on Friday, saying methods of gathering information about North Korea were sensitive.

Yonhap said the size of the missile was similar to a long-range rocket the North tested last month.

Experts have said the new three-stage rocket has a potential range of more than 6,700km, putting Alaska within its striking distance.

The North is likely to fire the missile shortly after the UN Security Council adopts a resolution criticizing its recent nuclear test, said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at Seoul’s University of North Korean Studies.

The resolution is expected to call on all countries to immediately enforce sanctions imposed by an earlier UN resolution after Pyongyang’s first nuclear test in 2006.

The sanctions include a partial arms embargo, a ban on luxury goods and ship searches for illegal weapons or material. They have been sporadically implemented, with many of the 192 UN member states ignoring them.

The draft would also have the Security Council condemn “in the strongest terms” the recent nuclear test “in flagrant violation and disregard” of the 2006 resolution.

DPP unhappy with government over Tiananmen snub
　

By Su Yong-Yao and Rich Chang
STAFF REPORTERS
Sunday, May 31, 2009, Page 3

The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday criticized the government for not planning any events to commemorate the 20th anniversary of China’s Tiananmen Square Massacre in what they said was a bid to avoid offending Beijing.

In contrast to his time as Taipei mayor, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) has been silent on the human rights situation in China since assuming office last May, DPP spokesman Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦) said.

“Democratic countries pay attention to China’s human rights situation while they engage with China, but Ma gives up the value of human rights,” Cheng said, calling on Ma to condemn the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) on the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown next month.

Presidential Office spokesman Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦) last week said Ma would not make a public statement but would release an article to mark the anniversary.

Earlier last week, the Presidential Office, citing a busy schedule, stonewalled a meeting with one of the then-student leaders of the Tiananmen Square protestors, Wang Dan (王丹), who was in Taiwan trying to rally bipartisan support for greater attention for the massacre in which hundreds of pro-democracy students were killed in a military crackdown.

The Presidential Office has also denied democratic activist Yang Jianli (楊建利) a meeting with Ma.

Yang’s participation in the democratic movement while in the US has landed him a spot on Beijing’s blacklist. Yang was deported and sent to Taiwan the last time he tried to visit Hong Kong. Sources said that during his time in Taiwan, a ranking party official phoned him and told him to “keep a low profile.”

Some Chinese dissidents with links to Taiwan have recently been informed that “Taiwan does not wish to commemorate or seek retribution over the massacre,” anonymous sources have said, speculating that this was a product of interactions between the KMT and the CCP.

However, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) officials rejected the claims and said that just because Ma could not meet the dissidents did not mean he was apathetic toward social causes.


The former KMT regime and the former DPP administration had secretly funded overseas democratic movements, but following the accession of the Ma government there have been rumors that government-backed financial support was cut off.


Rebutting the claim, MAC officials said the Ma administration maintained close contact with such groups and continues to fund them.

The MAC has not updated the section on human rights violations by China on its Web site. Asked for comment, MAC Spokesman Liu Te-hsun (劉德勳) said he would look into it.

KMT emblem sparks debate on historical sites
　

SYMBOLIC: Taipei City Government has been slammed over the repainting of a KMT symbol and for hanging calligraphy by the president on two municipal monuments

By Mo Yan-chih
STAFF REPORTER
Sunday, May 31, 2009, Page 3

The recent controversy surrounding the repainting of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) emblem on Taipei’s historical East Gate sparked concerns over the government’s apparent attempts to sneak autocratic symbols onto historical sites.

The Taipei City Government drew criticism from the opposition camp last week by painting the KMT emblem on the East Gate, also known as Jingfumen (景福門), during its renovation.

The KMT emblem was to be painted on another two historical gates in Taipei City, including the South Gate and Little South Gate, but the city government halted restoration work following the East Gate controversy.

PROTEST

The uproar led Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taipei City councilors Chuang Ruei-hsiung (莊瑞雄), Huang Hsiang-chun (黃向群) and Liu Yao-ren (劉耀仁) to climb to the roof of the East Gate last week and splash white paint over the emblem in protest against what they called a “symbol of dictatorship.”

In its defense, Taipei City’s Department of Cultural Affairs said the emblems were carved and painted in 1966 by the former-KMT regime during a modification of the Qing Dynasty gates and the department was simply restoring the monuments accordingly.

Commenting on the controvery, architecture and historical sites expert Huang Fu-san (黃富三), a member of Taipei City’s Cultural Assets Review Committee, said the KMT emblem on the gates was a product of the party-state system under the KMT regime.

Huang said the Council of Cultural Affairs (CCA) was responsible for failing to identify the emblem when it designated the four gates as national monuments in 1998.

Lee Chiang-lang (李乾朗), a professor of architecture at Chinese Culture University, was on the central government’s cultural assets review committee when the four historical gates were designated as monuments.

He said the committee had originally planned to designate the North Gate as a national monument because it was the only gate that preserved its original Qing Dynasty structure.

RESTORATION

The East Gate, South Gate and the Little South Gate were reconstructed in ancient Chinese palace style after former dictator Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) and the KMT came to Taiwan, he said.

The committee later agreed that all four historical gates, which had played a vital role in shaping the old downtown Taipei, should be designated as national monuments.

Lee did not explain whether the committee knew about the KMT emblem on the gates and said the committee had not addressed the issue of the emblem when designating the gates as monuments.

Lee and Hsin Wan-chiao (辛晚教), both members of Taipei City’s Cultural Assets Review Committee, said the emblem was representative of the situation at the time it was added.

As such it should be preserved but the issue was debatable and that modifications were permissible if carried out legally, they said.

“The KMT emblem on the gates can serve as a reminder of the old KMT dictatorship and how the party forced its ideologies into people’s lives. Reflecting the situation at a particular time is one of the values of monuments,” Hsin said.

Chuang, on the other hand, insisted the KMT emblem should be removed because it was “smuggled” onto the monuments by the KMT, and condemned President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration for restoring it.

Aside from the East Gate incident, the city government was also slammed for hanging two pieces of Ma’s calligraphy on municipal monuments, violating the Culture Heritage Preservation Law (文化資產保存法).

The Datung Police District Office, formerly the 1930s Taipei North Police Station, was designated as a municipal monument for its well-preserved Western-style structure.

Taipei City’s Culture Department hung an inscription with a piece of calligraphy by Ma that reads “Taiwan New Culture Memorial Hall Preparatory Office” on the front door of the office in 2006, DPP Taipei City Councilor Chien Yu-yen (簡余晏) said.

CALLIGRAPHY

Earlier this year, Taipei City’s Department of Civil Affairs put another piece of Ma’s calligraphy in Taipei’s Confucius Temple. The inscription is below another that Chiang Kai-shek sent to the temple in 1950, she said.

“The Taipei City Government’s move is no different to the former KMT regime adding the party emblem on the gates. It showed the KMT government’s autocratic mindset,” she said.

Chien accused the city government of violating Article 30 of the law by damaging the appearance of the monuments.

She said the city government should fine itself before taking action against the DPP councilors for painting over the emblem.

HK activist confirms death plot
　

NOT AFRAID:: Pro-democracy campaigner Martin Lee is not sure who was behind a plot to kill him during last year’s elections, but said he did not think it was the CCP

AFP , HONG KONG
Sunday, May 31, 2009, Page 5

Leading Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigner Martin Lee (李柱銘) said yesterday he was the target of an assassination plot during elections in the city last year.

The veteran activist, who founded the city’s Democratic Party, said two men had been arrested over the plot, which he said was foiled by police in August last year. The men were expected to stand trial in Hong Kong “soon,” he said.

Police had arrested an alleged hitman from China and a Hong Kong accomplice and seized a pistol and ammunition, the South China Morning Post reported.

A police spokesman was not available for comment.

“I was never afraid because, as a Catholic, death to me is just like pushing the door open to another life,” Lee told reporters after a meeting with US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Lee said he had been asked by police not to reveal the information, but had confirmed the story when contacted by a reporter this week.

The 70-year-old, who stepped down as a legislator last July, said he did not know who was behind the plot, but said the public exposure of the story could provide a warning.

“I hope the publication of the story will send a certain message to [whoever is behind the plot] that the police will still be trying to get to him or her,” he said, without elaborating.

The plot was uncovered during last year’s Legislative Council elections, one of the limited voting opportunities in the city.

Universal suffrage was promised to Hong Kong when it was handed back to China by colonial power Britain in 1997, but no timetable was set and democrats remain frustrated at the slow pace of constitutional reform.

Lee has also been at the forefront of the campaign to remember and vindicate pro-democracy activists who led a six-week protest in Tiananmen Square in Beijing in 1989.

The 20th anniversary of the crackdown on the protests — which left hundreds, possibly thousands, dead across the Chinese capital — will be marked on Thursday in Hong Kong with a candlelight vigil expected to draw tens of thousands.

Lee told the Post that he did not think the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), of which he has been a vocal critic, was linked to the plot to kill him.

“They are more keen to use character assassination,” said the lawyer, who is banned from China.

Hong Kong, which has a unique legal system from China, has an outspoken and vibrant political culture, but violence against politicians is rare.

In 2006, current Democratic Party Chairman Albert Ho (何俊仁) was attacked in a fast food restaurant by a gang wielding baseball bats, although it is not known if the attack was linked to his political activities. Other leading democrats have received death threats.

Pelosi, who has been a vocal critic of China’s rights record in the past, was heading a US delegation visiting China for meetings on the nation’s climate change agenda.

Lee said he had told Pelosi he was “extremely worried” about the slow pace of political reform in Hong Kong.

What the Roh case can teach us
　

By J. Michael Cole 寇謐將
Sunday, May 31, 2009, Page 8

The recent suicide of former South Korean president Roh Moo-hyun, who was under investigation for corruption, is bound to draw comparisons with the ongoing trial of former Taiwanese president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁). After all, the two former human rights lawyers have faced accusations of corruption — Chen of receiving or embezzling NT$490 million (US$15 million) and Roh of accepting US$6 million in bribes while in office.

In both cases, the investigations were launched after a transfer of power — from the Democratic Progressive Party to the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in Taiwan, and from the left-of-center Uri Party to the conservative Grand National Party (GNP) in South Korea. (Incidentally, just as in Taiwan, the previous government was “green” and was replaced by the opposition “blue.”)

In democratic countries, high-level corruption represents a betrayal of trust that can have ramifications on a party’s performance at the polls. In other words, votes will serve as a corrective to corruption. In one-party systems like China, however, corruption is seen as an impediment to the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), whose grip on power is contingent on its ability to maintain high economic growth and social stability. Anything that undermines that image or threatens to derail modernization — as high-level corruption does — is also perceived as a threat to the CCP, which in recent years has not refrained from ridding the party of highly visible corrupt officials. Under such a non-democratic system, however, direct popular elections cannot serve as an instrument to fight government corruption.

There are two areas in which both democracies and single-party states see eye-to-eye on corruption. One is in the use of corruption probes as a weapon for power plays within a political party, which is especially prevalent within the CCP but not unseen in multiparty democracies. The other — and this is of special interest here — is in the use of probes as a means to discredit the policies espoused by the targeted political figures in another party.

While they were in power, both Roh and Chen advocated policies that were extremely divisive.

In Chen’s case, his advocacy of an independent Taiwan alienated a sector of the polity that either sought to maintain the “status quo” with China or clearly supported eventual unification.

As for Roh, his most contentious — and equally divisive — policy was his decision to continue the “Sunshine Policy” of his predecessor, Kim Dae-jung, toward North Korea, which culminated in a visit by Roh in Pyongyang in October 2007. In January that year, the main opposition GNP — a hardline on North Korea — criticized Roh’s government for trying to arrange the Inter-Korean Summit.

In both cases, the opposition had substantial influence on the media.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said in a report that the so-called “Big Three” conservative newspapers in South Korea — the Chosun Ilbo, JoongAng Ilbo and Dong-A Ilbo — together accounted for about 70 percent of the country’s newspaper market. These dailies, the CPJ said, had all been critical of Kim’s “Sunshine Policy.” Unsurprisingly, when major South Korean media outlets, including the three mentioned, faced tax evasion probes in 2001, the GNP turned out to be their “loud champion,” as the CPJ reported.

In December last year, the Korean Central News Agency reported that Media Action, a grouping of 48 civic and public organizations, including the south Korean Press Trade Union, denounced moves by the GNP — which came to power on Dec. 19, 2007, replacing Roh — to put media under its control. The group accused the party of seeking to revise media laws in ways that risked undermining impartiality and favored conservative media such as the Chosun Ilbo.

A clear link between the GNP’s control of the media, hardline stance on inter-Korean dialogue and the level of publicity surrounding the Roh case can be established. It is therefore not impossible that through the media and the judiciary, the GNP sought to discredit Roh’s policies vis-à-vis North Korea by focusing on allegations of corruption against him. Soon after his death, some South Koreans were already starting to ask if the media and the judiciary might not have come down “too hard” on Roh — something that would equally apply to the Chen case in Taiwan, where a large sector of the media falls under direct or indirect control of the KMT, and where the government has been accused of meddling in the judiciary.

It is interesting to note, too, that much like the KMT, the GNP has its roots in a military dictatorship, in this case that of Park Chung-hee in 1963, when it was known as the Democratic Republican Party. Such political dowry may have played a role — an old reflex, perhaps — in the KMT and the GNP’s use of mass propaganda campaigns to discredit not just a political opponent, but also an ideology (Taiwanese independence; liberal policies regarding North Korea).

The similarities in the Chen and Roh cases are more than superficial and may expose deep undercurrents in how young democracies with an authoritarian past address corruption. In both instances, the storm that has accompanied the probes against former officials point to a politicization of the process and the dangers inherent in government control of the media.

J. Michael Cole is a writer based in Taipei.

Integration with China is not the solution
　

By Lu Chun-wei 盧俊偉
Sunday, May 31, 2009, Page 8

‘Given that the US and the EU are still the major end markets, Taiwan should not focus its efforts on how to integrate more closely with [China].’

When asked how Taiwan should deal with future cross-strait politics and economics, some commentators argue that given China’s formidable rise thanks to its powerful trade and economy, Taiwan should adopt a more open and integrated approach toward China to benefit from the process.

However, such a vague and conceptual understanding of the Chinese economy may cause the government to misjudge the priorities for its international and cross-strait economic policies.

Since the 1990s, China has risen rapidly to become a major economic power, but a closer look at the its economic development and, to a greater degree, the operations of the Asia-Pacific economic system reveals an inherent weakness — a heavy dependence on exports and the US market. US Nobel laureate in economics Paul Krugman, Morgan Stanley Asia chairman Stephen Roach and World Bank chief economist Justin Lin (林毅夫) and Chinese economist Shen Minggao (沈明高) have all expressed similar concerns.

The Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s revealed the structural weakness of the East Asian economies, which competed for export markets by depreciating their currencies. These East Asian nations, including China, have since come to realize that relying on exports to the US to spur economic growth has its limitations and have therefore started to adopt strategies to boost domestic demand in the hope of balancing the risks of excessive dependence on exports.

Ten years have passed, but China and other Asian nations are even more reliant on exports to drive economic growth. Looking at the Asian economies as a whole, exports’ share of GDP has risen to 45 percent — up from 35 percent a decade ago. China, for one, draws more than 50 percent of its growth from exports, with the US being its biggest market.

China remains vulnerable in its dependence on exports and the US market to augment its economic growth. This means that a decline in US consumption demand or implementation of trade barriers and sanctions by the US government would lead to a drastic drop in Chinese exports and have a large impact on the entire Chinese economy.

The current global financial storm, which has affected Chinese exports, has prompted Beijing to adopt a 4 trillion yuan (US$585 billion) economic stimulus package in an attempt to revive its economy. This reflects the vulnerability of the Chinese economic growth model.

Given that the US and the EU are still the major end markets, Taiwan should not focus its efforts on how to integrate more closely with the Chinese production chain to stay cost-competitive. Instead, it should pay attention to new policies and industrial changes being implemented by the governments in the EU and the US amid the financial crisis. Both the Taiwanese government and businesses should focus their efforts on improving local industrial technologies and enhancing the global competitiveness and added value of Taiwanese products.

Lu Chun-wei is a research fellow at Taiwan Thinktank.