In 1989 the EU passed a resolution imposing a ban on arms sales to China to protest the forceful suppression of the Tiananmen democracy movement in the face of international public opinion, thereby imposing sanctions on China for its savage violence.
EU countries had recently discussed whether to abolish this ban, but on Dec. 18, the European Parliament decided against such action with a landslide vote -- 373 votes against, 32 in favor and 29 abstentions. On Dec. 19, immediately following the EU resolution, the Dutch parliament also passed a resolution requiring the Dutch government to express its opposition to abolishing the ban.
The European and Dutch parliamentary resolutions in fact highlight the importance the EU places on the Taiwan Strait security issue. Taiwan is not alone in advocating the preservation of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait. It is also advocated by advanced democratic countries, and coincides with the interests of EU countries.
To be able to maintain stability in the Taiwan Strait and dissolve the armed threat posed by China's missiles, Taiwan has to work through both military and non-military channels. Militarily speaking, Taiwan has to establish a complete defense system and a healthy public psychological defense to restrict Chinese attempts to invade the country.
From a non-military perspective, Taiwan should concentrate on a preventive referendum in its endeavor to win international understanding and support to ensure its national security.
In other words, Taiwan needs to make the international community understand that the preventive referendum to be held on March 20 next year is a peace referendum aiming at highlighting the seriousness of the Chinese dictatorship's armed threats against democratic Taiwan. The people of Taiwan will use their collective democratic will to demand that China remove its missiles aimed at Taiwan and give up its threats.
The Taiwanese people's quest for peace naturally coincides with the EU countries' interests in the Asian region. Continuing to allow China to freely raise the level of its threats will lead to a military imbalance in the region, and it will also have a negative impact on prospects for peace and stability.
A preventive referendum will demonstrate Taiwan's efforts to realize direct democracy and preserve peace. This coincides with the international community's mainstream values. The reason the relationship between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait has become more tense is not the result of Taiwan's initiating a preventive referendum. The real reason is China's constant threats against Taiwan.
The international community should support peaceful and democratic Taiwan and oppose a communist China endangering regional and international peace. Once China dismantles the missiles aimed at Taiwan and clearly declares that it gives up the option of launching an armed attack on Taiwan, there will no longer be a need to hold a preventive referendum.
Chen Lung-chu is the chairman of the Taiwan New Century Foundation.
Translated by Perry Svensson
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
Ursula K. le Guin in The Ones Who Walked Away from Omelas proposed a thought experiment of a utopian city whose existence depended on one child held captive in a dungeon. When taken to extremes, Le Guin suggests, utilitarian logic violates some of our deepest moral intuitions. Even the greatest social goods — peace, harmony and prosperity — are not worth the sacrifice of an innocent person. Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), since leaving office, has lived an odyssey that has brought him to lows like Le Guin’s dungeon. From late 2008 to 2015 he was imprisoned, much of this
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and