Last Friday's speech by the fourth-ranked Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader, Jia Qinglin (賈慶林), clearly demonstrates that China still does not understand Taiwan. Although it was a major statement commemorating the 10th anniversary of former Chinese president Jiang Zemin's (江澤民) so-called Eight Points, the speech said little that was new. Other than giving a few hints about China's proposed anti-secession law, the speech uses racist argumentation and falsehoods to make its case.
Jia begins by noting how Jiang reiterated the policies of "peaceful unification" and "one country, two systems" -- policies which came from Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平). According to Jia, everything was fine until the mid-1990s when Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) pushed the "separatist activities" of creating "two Chinas" and "one China, one Taiwan."
Jia said that Jiang's eight points "supported the principle of one China, the foundation and prerequisite for achieving peaceful unification."
But the speech did not recognize that such a prerequisite would end negotiations before they began. This renders meaningless the subsequent statement that "under the prerequisite of one China, we can discuss any topic."
Perhaps the most disappointing feature of Jia's speech is its use of racist argumentation. He claims that Taiwanese are Chinese because of their "bones and flesh" and states, "the 21st century is the century of the Chinese people achieving a great renaissance," a "great renaissance that is the joint desire of all Chinese sons and daughters."
Such racist language goes back to Sun Yat-sen's (
The one new point in Jia's speech is his short discussion of the proposed "Anti-Secession National Law" (反分裂國家法). He says, "This law will codify as law the policies which our party and government have implemented for more than 20 years to achieve a peaceful solution to the Taiwan question using the basic policies of peaceful unification and `one country, two systems' and the Eight Points."
According to Jia, "This law will also make clear that all the Chinese people will defend the nation's sovereignty and its territorial integrity, and that they absolutely will not accept `Taiwan independence' separatist forces using any name or any method to separate Taiwan from China."
Jia says that in the early 1990s, Taiwan accepted the "1992 consensus" in which both sides agreed to "one China, with each side making its own interpretation." Originally, China denied that such a 1992 consensus existed, only saying in late 2001 that such a consensus had been agreed to, during Taiwan's legislative elections when the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) said as much. At that time, Su Chi (蘇起), a former KMT official who later served as vice-chairman and chairman of the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC), maintained that such a consensus existed, but people in the MAC looked for evidence and found none.
Finally, Jia argues that we "advocate the new path of developing relations across the straits with Taiwan's political parties, groups and representative personages to seek discussions and the resolution of problems."
In China, the CCP controls government and groups as well as "personages," but Taiwan is now a democracy and must be represented by its government. Jia, like his predecessors in enunciating Chinese policy, fails to understand this change. Rather, he says Taiwan identity, democracy and reform are simply banners of the "`Taiwan Independence' separatist forces" who wish to use all their energies to push "desinification," "cultural Taiwan independence" and "rectification of Taiwan's name."
Charter flights across the Taiwan Strait during the Lunar New Year are great for Taiwanese businessmen and their families, but China cannot hope for genuine progress in cross-strait relations until it significantly increases its understanding of Taiwan and changes its policies accordingly. What initial steps could China take to improve its relations with Taiwan without giving too much away?
First, even without changing its rhetoric, as a measure to promote mutual confidence, China could reduce the number of missiles pointed at Taiwan. Second, China could attempt to demonstrate the bona fides of its "one country, two systems" policy by genuinely giving Hong Kong more autonomy. Third, China could agree to more practical cross-strait measures such as taking back its citizens that are currently in Taiwan's jails for illegal entry.
Bruce Jacobs is a professor of Asian languages and studies at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has long been expansionist and contemptuous of international law. Under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), the CCP regime has become more despotic, coercive and punitive. As part of its strategy to annex Taiwan, Beijing has sought to erase the island democracy’s international identity by bribing countries to sever diplomatic ties with Taipei. One by one, China has peeled away Taiwan’s remaining diplomatic partners, leaving just 12 countries (mostly small developing states) and the Vatican recognizing Taiwan as a sovereign nation. Taiwan’s formal international space has shrunk dramatically. Yet even as Beijing has scored diplomatic successes, its overreach
After more than a year of review, the National Security Bureau on Monday said it has completed a sweeping declassification of political archives from the Martial Law period, transferring the full collection to the National Archives Administration under the National Development Council. The move marks another significant step in Taiwan’s long journey toward transitional justice. The newly opened files span the architecture of authoritarian control: internal security and loyalty investigations, intelligence and counterintelligence operations, exit and entry controls, overseas surveillance of Taiwan independence activists, and case materials related to sedition and rebellion charges. For academics of Taiwan’s White Terror era —
After 37 US lawmakers wrote to express concern over legislators’ stalling of critical budgets, Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) pledged to make the Executive Yuan’s proposed NT$1.25 trillion (US$39.7 billion) special defense budget a top priority for legislative review. On Tuesday, it was finally listed on the legislator’s plenary agenda for Friday next week. The special defense budget was proposed by President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration in November last year to enhance the nation’s defense capabilities against external threats from China. However, the legislature, dominated by the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), repeatedly blocked its review. The
In her article in Foreign Affairs, “A Perfect Storm for Taiwan in 2026?,” Yun Sun (孫韻), director of the China program at the Stimson Center in Washington, said that the US has grown indifferent to Taiwan, contending that, since it has long been the fear of US intervention — and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) inability to prevail against US forces — that has deterred China from using force against Taiwan, this perceived indifference from the US could lead China to conclude that a window of opportunity for a Taiwan invasion has opened this year. Most notably, she observes that
RSS