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China's
bullying tactics on June 28, 2004 China's
bullying tactics like Nazis: Lee `OBNOXIOUS
BEHAVIOR': The former president said Beijing should worry more about its own
problems and less about nationalism and stop its intimidation efforts China's latest acts of
intimidation against Taiwanese entertainers and China-based businesspeople
proves that Beijing has not yet altered its imperialist and nationalistic
attitude, said former president Lee Teng-hui , warning that its efforts to
suppress Taiwan will only get worse. "Such bullying behavior is similar to that of the Nazis," Lee
said. "The obnoxious behavior is not targeted at individual Taiwanese but at
the nation's freedom and democracy," he said. "As long as China is not a democratic country, people who believe in
freedom and democracy will continue to be suppressed by China and treated as its
enemy," he said. Lee made the remarks in a keynote speech at a seminar entitled
"Support China-based Taiwanese businesspeople, call out to China." The seminar, organized by the Taiwan Advocate and Taiwan Thinktank, was
called to review the "march west" economic policy of many China-based
Taiwanese businesspeople. During Lee's one-hour speech, he called on the public to speak up in
response to the recent string of intimidation efforts against Taiwan-ese in
China, including the Aboriginal pop diva Chang Hui-mei , better known as A-mei,
and Chi Mei Group founder Hsu Wen-lung . A-mei was forced to cancel a concert last week due to an online boycott
staged by students from Zhejiang University, who accused her of supporting
Taiwan's independence and called on Beijing to stop her from earning money in
China. The official People's Daily accused Hsu of using profits gained in
China to finance the independence movement in Taiwan. Hsu later relinquished his position as Chi Mei chairman in an attempt to
defuse tensions. Lee said that many of this nation's economic problems, such as high
unemployment and deflation, could be attributed to the fact that the "no
haste, be patient" policy he pioneered was not thoroughly carried out.
"Without this policy, problems such as overproduction, high
unemployment and kidnappings of China-based Taiwanese business-people would be
even worse," he said. China's rapid economic development has not led it to become a freer and
more democratic state, only to become more tyrannical, he said. Lee called on China to pay more attention to its own economic problems and
less to nationalism. "To prevent nationalism and anti-democratic thinking from causing
internal disorder ... China must stop treating Taiwan, Japan and the US as its
enemies and make genuine efforts to cooperate and get along with Taiwan and
other countries," Lee said. If Beijing fails to change its erroneous polices, Lee said, the Taiwanese
people must realize that China will never regard Taiwan as its friend or ally. The government and other countries should learn a lesson from the failed
experience of China-based Taiwanese businesspeople and never seek to appease
China's bullying behavior, he said. Lee called on businesspeople to focus more on developing a knowledge-based
economy and less on moving to China. "We must walk our own path so we don't have to depend on China nor be
afraid of it," Lee said. Following Lee's speech, five political and economic commentators, including
Chinese dissident writer Cao Chang-qing and Taiwan Thinktank chairman Chen Po-chih
spoke during a panel discussion. Labelling China's intimidation against Taiwanese entertainers and
businesspeople "hooliganism," Cao called on the Taiwanese people and
government to fight back. "Don't think you lucked out if you have not been targeted by the
Chinese government this time, because your time will come," Cao said. "The Taiwanese should stand up and tell China that you won't accept
its intimidation," he said. US
should recognize its true ally By
Chen Ching-chih "Mr. Hu Jintao , dump your `one China' principle!" It would be
fitting for US President George W. Bush to thus echo his predecessor in office,
the late president Ronald Reagan, who in 1987 told the Soviet Union's Mikhail
Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall. For China to end its "one
China" principle is the only way to ensure genuine and long-lasting peace
and stability across the Taiwan Strait. Beijing's principle that "there is only one China and Taiwan is a part
of that China" is a fiction. Taiwan has never been a part of the People's
Republic of China, which was established in 1949. In 1895, China ceded Taiwan to
Japan in a peace treaty signed by the two countries. For the next half-century
Taiwan was a Japanese colony. After Japan's defeat in 1945 it renounced
sovereignty over Taiwan. This renouncement of sovereignty was officially
confirmed in the 1951 San Francisco peace treaty signed by Japan and over 50
allied nations. Even the subsequent 1952 treaty between Japan and Chiang Kai-shek's
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government only repeated Japan's
renunciation of its claim to Taiwan. Neither treaty designated a specific
country as the recipient of the renounced sovereignty. Therefore, Taiwan has
been an independent country for the past half-century. Indeed, until 1979 the US recognized Taiwan as a sovereign country.
Unfortunately for the people of Taiwan, the process of US derecognition of
Taiwan began in 1972. Seeking to detach the PRC from the Soviet camp during the
Cold War and to gain Beijing's help in ending the Vietnam War, then US president
Richard Nixon agreed to "acknowledge" that the Chinese on both sides
of the Taiwan Strait had claimed Taiwan to be a part of China. The US government
switched its diplomatic recognition to Beijing in 1979, and in the process began
a stampede of nations severing their diplomatic ties with Taiwan. Taiwan had
earlier been kicked out of the UN, and consequently has been isolated
diplomatically since the 1970s. The Cold War was over by the late 1980s, when the Soviet-led communist camp
broke up and the Soviet Union dissolved, leaving the US as the world's sole
superpower. China's leaders wisely decided to occupy themselves primarily with
economic development. Yet while China has claimed that it is striving to
"rise up peacefully," it has nevertheless continued to threaten Taiwan
militarily. Taiwan has been undergoing rapid and drastic changes also. In the late
1960s the nation accelerated its economic development process and by the late
1980s it had become one of Asia's four newly industrialized countries. However,
it remained under the KMT government's authoritarian rule, which had begun in
the 1945 aftermath of Japan's surrender when US General Douglas MacArthur
entrusted Chiang and his government with the occupation and administration of
Taiwan. Under the rule of Chiang and later his son, the people of Taiwan had no
real voice. But a long and painful process of democratization resulted in Taiwan
being listed by the US-based Freedom House conservative think tank as one of
Asia's two freest countries, Japan being the other. Less than 10 percent of Taiwanese consider themselves Chinese. An even
smaller percentage of the nation's population would want Taiwan to become part
of undemocratic China. What people really want is an independent country in
which they are masters of their own destiny. Having elected their president
since 1996, the people of Taiwan are indeed the owners of national sovereignty.
In this age of human rights, the US and other democratic nations are obligated
to support Taiwan, which shares their liberal democratic values, such as respect
for human rights and the rule of law. Given a changed world and the nation's new circumstances, the US must
re-assess its Taiwan policy. The US cannot afford to continue to be stuck with a
Cold War-era policy based on the "one China" myth. Furthermore, at a
time when the US is playing a major role in promoting its democracy worldwide,
particularly in Afghanistan and Iraq, Taiwan must be liberated from diplomatic
isolation so that it can serve as a beacon of democracy in Asia. One can understand why the US does not recognize Cuba and North Korea,
which are both communist countries. However, it is increasingly difficult for
the US to justify its refusal to recognize a free and democratic Taiwan. Instead
of treating Taiwan merely as a trustworthy ally under the US'
less-than-guaranteed military protection, the US must now work for Taiwan's
return to the international community wherein it is a member state no less than
the newly established East Timor. But first of all, the US must face reality and
grant Taiwan diplomatic recognition. Chen
Ching-chih is a history professor emeritus at Southern Illinois University.
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