An independence activist once said that China will never disappoint us (independence proponents) because it would always trigger the Taiwanese people's abhorrence at the crucial juncture. Looking at China's disparaging and vicious treatment of this country over the years, one has to say that he was a prophet.
Distant instances range from China's moves to fire missiles into the seas near Taiwan in military exercises, to then premier Zhu Rongji's (朱鎔基) saber-rattling to threaten voters in the run up to the 2000 presidential election. Such behavior not only disgusted the people here but also resulted in strong countereffects.
In the wake of the 921 earthquake, what China did is a fine example of requiting kindness with ingratitude, completely forgetting how Taiwan had enthu-siastically made donations to help its flood-relief efforts earlier. When journalists later asked flood victims whether they had received donations from abroad, they said they had never heard of any and only got a box of cookies. Journalists then realized that Beijing had imposed a news blackout on the donations from Taiwan and Hong Kong and that the money had been embezzled by cadres at various levels.
After the 921 earthquake, China required countries that wanted to send personnel to help Taiwan to first get its approval. It even denied the use of its air space to a Russian plane, with a rescue team and relief supplies on board, headed for Taiwan. This disgusting bullying manner simply repelled the Taiwanese people.
Four years on, has China changed its attitude? Has it learned the lesson? Not a bit. As SARS has spread from filthy China to nearly the whole world and Taiwan has seen a rising number of SARS cases, Beijing even required the World Health Organization (WHO) to get its ratification before dispatching personnel to investigate SARS situation here.
In addition to reiterating its platitude that Taiwan is part of China, Beijing aims to cheat the international community into believing that China is capable of "taking care of" Taiwan's medical health.
This is as ridiculous as India boasting that it has the ability to resolve the health problems of England and the US. When the SARS outbreak had just started, China forbade the WHO from putting Taiwan on its list of reported SARS cases, wholeheartedly aiming to turn this country's SARS problem into a part of "China's internal affairs." This move politicized the SARS issue.
When the SARS outbreak had just surfaced in early March, one of China's airlines wanted to provide Taiwan with the passenger list for a plane suspected of having carried a SARS patient, but it was unexpectedly barred from doing so by China's Civil Aviation Administration. What a shitty government!
This is not the end of China's folly. KMT Chairman Lien Chan (連戰) has said he will visit Bei-jing if he is elected president next year. To everyone's surprise, Chi-nese government officials were stupid enough to say that they "welcome anyone to come and visit under the precondition of the `one China' principle." That response got Lien into hot water because it almost confirms President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) ridicule of Lien's plan as a "voyage of surrender."
Now many countries feel uneasy to see that Taiwan is fighting the SARS epidemic in isolation and they have proposed to make the country a member of the WHO. China, as usual, spares no efforts to oppose the plan.
Apparently, this plague cannot waken China. The fact that Taiwan is moving farther and farther away from China is driven by its imbecility.
Pu Ta-chung is chief editorial writer of Apple Daily, where this article first appeared.
Translated by Jackie Lin
Two sets of economic data released last week by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) have drawn mixed reactions from the public: One on the nation’s economic performance in the first quarter of the year and the other on Taiwan’s household wealth distribution in 2021. GDP growth for the first quarter was faster than expected, at 6.51 percent year-on-year, an acceleration from the previous quarter’s 4.93 percent and higher than the agency’s February estimate of 5.92 percent. It was also the highest growth since the second quarter of 2021, when the economy expanded 8.07 percent, DGBAS data showed. The growth
In the intricate ballet of geopolitics, names signify more than mere identification: They embody history, culture and sovereignty. The recent decision by China to refer to Arunachal Pradesh as “Tsang Nan” or South Tibet, and to rename Tibet as “Xizang,” is a strategic move that extends beyond cartography into the realm of diplomatic signaling. This op-ed explores the implications of these actions and India’s potential response. Names are potent symbols in international relations, encapsulating the essence of a nation’s stance on territorial disputes. China’s choice to rename regions within Indian territory is not merely a linguistic exercise, but a symbolic assertion
More than seven months into the armed conflict in Gaza, the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to take “immediate and effective measures” to protect Palestinians in Gaza from the risk of genocide following a case brought by South Africa regarding Israel’s breaches of the 1948 Genocide Convention. The international community, including Amnesty International, called for an immediate ceasefire by all parties to prevent further loss of civilian lives and to ensure access to life-saving aid. Several protests have been organized around the world, including at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and many other universities in the US.
Every day since Oct. 7 last year, the world has watched an unprecedented wave of violence rain down on Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territories — more than 200 days of constant suffering and death in Gaza with just a seven-day pause. Many of us in the American expatriate community in Taiwan have been watching this tragedy unfold in horror. We know we are implicated with every US-made “dumb” bomb dropped on a civilian target and by the diplomatic cover our government gives to the Israeli government, which has only gotten more extreme with such impunity. Meantime, multicultural coalitions of US