It would have been nice to write the editorial that we had planned, an upbeat piece about how, now President Chen Shui-bian (
Let us make it clear, this rapprochement must still take place. And in this light Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Lien Chan's (
It was not a concession speech. It was not the speech that an honorable and responsible political figure would make telling his supporters that they had had to abide by the verdict of the ballot, go home and try again in four years time.
Instead Lien told his supporters that the election had been stolen, he demanded that it be annulled and tried his best to turn an election crowd into a vengeful mob. The message Lien gave his supporters was that until the assassination attempt on the president on Friday was cleared up, the election should not have gone ahead.
This is amazingly ironic given that it was the pan-blues who had said that the Democratic Progressive Party would try to find some pretext before the election to declare martial law and stop it from happening. Even with the president lying shot in hospital -- and let us reiterate that the idea that the president had himself shot in the stomach as a ploy to win the election can only be the product of minds unhinged by the irrationality and bitterness of the pan-blue campaign -- the DPP stood firm on its commitment to democratic practices. It is the pan-blues that now want the election, having taken place, annulled. Why? Simply because they lost.
The pan-blues reject the result of the election because they lost. Taiwan is apparently only allowed to hold elections that the pan-blues win. Thus the pan-blues show what their real attitude toward democracy is. Something perhaps like Joseph Stalin's who once said that the trouble with free elections was that you never knew who was going to win them.
Let us be frank: Today's pan-blues are yesterday's bunch of vicious, thieving, fascistic thugs who raped and looted Taiwan for half a century. They have been trying to give the impression that they are reformed, that they are democrats to the core and during the election campaign we at least tried to believe that this was so, even if we though their policies stank. But last night they reveled themselves in their true colors.
There was patently nothing wrong with the election -- it was honestly carried out and the vote tallying was impartial. That the DPP went ahead with it after Friday's shooting was none the less brave for being the sensible thing to do. We have no doubt that the challenge to the election will fail. But we now have to fear what mischief the pan-blues have up their sleeves.
Lien last night appeared to want to foment a state of civil insurrection. This is either because his mind has been unhinged by losing or because he seeks a pretext to invite China to intervene in Taiwan's affairs.
It is absurd to think this would not be resisted. Lien is either a case for psychiatric treatment or a two-time loser who would rather lead Taiwan into war than admit that, with a 20-point lead a year ago, the election was the pan-blues' to lose -- and they lost it.
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China’s supreme objective in a war across the Taiwan Strait is to incorporate Taiwan as a province of the People’s Republic. It follows, therefore, that international recognition of Taiwan’s de jure independence is a consummation that China’s leaders devoutly wish to avoid. By the same token, an American strategy to deny China that objective would complicate Beijing’s calculus and deter large-scale hostilities. For decades, China has cautioned “independence means war.” The opposite is also true: “war means independence.” A comprehensive strategy of denial would guarantee an outcome of de jure independence for Taiwan in the event of Chinese invasion or
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Former Fijian prime minister Mahendra Chaudhry spoke at the Yushan Forum in Taipei on Monday, saying that while global conflicts were causing economic strife in the world, Taiwan’s New Southbound Policy (NSP) serves as a stabilizing force in the Indo-Pacific region and offers strategic opportunities for small island nations such as Fiji, as well as support in the fields of public health, education, renewable energy and agricultural technology. Taiwan does not have official diplomatic relations with Fiji, but it is one of the small island nations covered by the NSP. Chaudhry said that Fiji, as a sovereign nation, should support
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