Listen to the voice

Group leaves to lobby for UN bid
　

By Jenny W. Hsu
STAFF REPORTER
Saturday, Sep 13, 2008, Page 1

“How can he [Minister of Foreign Affairs Francisco Ou] say such a thing when great harm has been done? To avoid angering Beijing, Taiwan has dropped its request for full representation in the UN.”— Chai Trong-rong, Democratic Progressive Party legislator

Taiwan is a sovereign state and fully qualifies for a seat in the UN, a group of lobbyists said in Taipei yesterday before leaving for New York to launch their annual campaign to promote the nation’s UN bid.

Led by Democratic Progressive Party legislators Twu Shiing-jer (涂醒哲) and Chai Trong-rong (蔡同榮), the 26-member delegation is expected to arrive at UN headquarters in Manhattan tomorrow.

The 63rd session of the UN General Assembly will open on Tuesday.

The group slammed President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) for downgrading Taiwan’s status and giving in to China’s demands after taking office in May.

Instead of bidding for full membership in the global body like the nation has in the past, the Ma administration said this year Taiwan is only seeking “meaningful participation” in activities under UN specialized agencies.

‘DIPLOMATIC TRUCE’

Chai also lambasted Minister of Foreign Affairs Francisco Ou (歐鴻鍊) for saying on Thursday that the “diplomatic truce” Taipei has initiated with Beijing “has done no harm to Taiwan.”

“How can he say such a thing when great harm has been done? To avoid angering Beijing, Taiwan has dropped its request for full representation in the UN,” Chai said.

He said that without UN membership, it would be impossible for the nation to participate in any UN agency activity.

Yen Chiang-lung (顏江龍), a member of the group, said China was the only obstacle to Taiwan gaining UN representation.

CHINA FACTOR

“Once the China factor is removed, Taiwan would be in the UN right away. The opinion of all other nations [on the issue] has little significance. It’s just China,” Yen said.

A pan-blue supporter mocked the group’s efforts, saying the lobby was just an excuse for a tour to the US East Coast.

“The lawmakers are just staging a show to prop up their popularity,” the man said, but declined to give his name.

“If they really wanted to do something for Taiwan, they would stop creating factions within society,” he said.

Listen to the voice

Envoy urges US to review ‘outdated’ Taiwan guidelines

STAFF WRITER, WITH CNA
Saturday, Sep 13, 2008, Page 3

Taiwan’s representative to the US on Thursday renewed a proposal for the US government to review its guidelines on relations with Taiwan, which set various restrictions on the unofficial interactions between Washington and Taipei.

Representative to the US Jason Yuan (袁健生) said some of the restrictions listed in the guidelines seem out of date because they have remained unchanged for decades, “although Taiwan-US relations have been progressing.”

The US State Department has routinely repeated the guidelines to all US embassies between August and September every year since the 1980s, Yuan said.

He said the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the US has on many occasions requested Washington to review the guidelines, and that he believed the two sides would eventually come to a consensus for change after mutual trust is established.

Yuan made the remarks when asked by Taiwanese media to comment on the US State Department’s move last week to again notify US embassies of the guidelines.

In a report published on Thursday, the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) cited an unidentified former US official as saying the situation indicated that the recent transition of power in Taiwan and improvement in Taiwan-China relations had not led to any change in the policy of the administration of US President George W. Bush toward Taiwan.

For any possible breakthrough to be achieved, Taiwan would have to continue to challenge the restrictions through the new US administration to be elected in November, the official told the daily.

The guidelines were adopted by the US government after Washington switched recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979.

Among other stipulations, the guidelines specify that meetings between US and Taiwanese officials may not occur in the State Department buildings, the White House or the Old Executive Office Building, and that executive branch personnel are not permitted to attend functions held at the Washington residence of Taiwan’s representative to the US.

Officials from the US Department of Defense and State Department above the rank of office director or the rank of colonel or Navy captain are also restricted under the regulations from traveling to Taiwan on “official business,” while executive branch officials at or above the level of assistant secretary of state or three-star flag military officers may not visit Taiwan for personal travel without advance clearance from the State Department. All travel must be on “tourist” rather than “official” passports.

In addition, executive branch personnel are not permitted to officially correspond by mail directly with Taiwanese officials unless their correspondence is first sent to the American Institute in Taiwan.

The guidelines also restrict executive branch personnel from referring to the people of Taiwan as “Taiwanese,” but require them instead to refer to the population as the “people on Taiwan.”

Listen to the voice

Sovereign status: Ma is throwing it all away
　

By Shih Cheng-Feng 施正鋒
Saturday, Sep 13, 2008, Page 8

With the nation in the midst of an economic downturn, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in an interview with a foreign media outlet that although the relationship between Taiwan and China is special, it is not state-to-state in nature. The Presidential Office added that the cross-strait relationship involves two “areas.” It appears that Taiwan’s sovereignty can now be downplayed.

In 1991, president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) ended emergency measures for the “communist rebellion” and said there was “one China, two areas and two political entities.” He did so to counteract China’s “one country, two systems” and not as a plan for long-term peace and stability. Whereas Lee’s “one country, two areas” referred to one “free area” and one “fallen area,” today we have returned to the original meaning — the “Taiwan area” and the “Mainland area.”

At the time, Mainland Affairs Council chairman Huang Kun-huei (黃昆輝) attempted to apply for UN membership for Taiwan using a “one country, two seats” model, while then minister of economic affairs Chiang Pin-kung (江丙坤) at an APEC meeting in Seattle tested the notion of two Chinas for a transitional period.

However, with China’s refusal to recognize Taiwan as an equal political entity and procrastination by conservatives led by then premier Hau Pei-tsun (郝柏村), these efforts proved futile.

Before stepping down, Lee drew a red line with his statement about a “special state-to-state relationship” between Taiwan and China: the so-called “state-to-state” discourse. Although this did not explicitly claim there was one Taiwan and one China, it clearly said that there were two Chinas. This is also why Beijing hates Lee.

Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) dared not cross the line and could only ambiguously say that there were “two Chinese countries.” The Democratic Progressive Party was in power and Taiwan was independent; the only mission left was to correct the national title.

Chen’s foreign policies were aimed at mobilizing party supporters at elections and did not serve the interests of the public. Wavering between abolishing the Guidelines for National Unification and the National Unification Council and promoting cross-strait integration, Chen’s use of the slogan “one country on each side of the Taiwan Strait” was only a metaphor for the “two China” discourse.

The thrust of Ma’s policy toward China has always been “one China, with each side having its own interpretation” based on the so-called “1992 consensus” created by Su Chi (蘇起), now secretary-general of the National Security Council.

Ma wants to shelve the sovereignty dispute and avoid confrontation with China in exchange for gestures of Chinese goodwill, including allowing Taiwanese participation in international organizations. This subordinates Taiwan’s diplomacy to China’s and is the reason why Ma has proposed “flexible diplomacy” and a “diplomatic truce.”

If the biggest sovereignty issue were the status of Kinmen and Matsu, then shelving the dispute would be acceptable.

But Beijing still maintains that Taiwan is a breakaway province, and Taipei is reacting meekly and subserviently, as if it were abandoning sovereignty.

When a weaker state makes unilateral concessions, it only harms itself. This is the reality of international politics. Taiwan can hold talks with China on not undermining one another, but it must not depend on China.

If Ma does this out of rigid adherence to the constitutional “one China” formula, then he is naive; if he does so because of international realities, then he is beyond help; but if he does so to revive the economy without concern for sovereignty, then he is doomed.

Shih Cheng-feng is dean of the College of Indigenous Studies at National Dong Hwa University.