On Monday, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice began her first trip to Asia after taking up her new post in late January. Besides the issue of peace between India and Pakistan, another likely focus of Rice's trip will be the current unstable situation in East Asia. The two most dangerous hotspots in the region are caused by two Stalinist regimes -- North Korea and China -- which threaten regional peace.
After former US president Richard Nixon opened the door to China in 1972, the US' China policy -- under the guidance of national security adviser Henry Kissinger -- became enthralled by a romantic, even mystical view of China's potential. That led to the mistaken belief that this socialist regime with so-called "Chinese characteristics" would be different from other such regimes. The striped-pants set at the US State Department convinced itself that patience and gentle prodding would create economic development, the appearance of a middle class and the peaceful transformation of China into a stable society. This, despite the fact that the Communist regime had just killed 20 million of its own people during the Cultural Revolution.
We hope that on her trip through Asia, Rice will discern the true face of China's communist government. There are some signs this has already happened. Why else would the US have used unusually strong language in its human rights report published on Feb. 28 to condemn China's violations, including the use of the US-led war on terror as a pretext for brutally suppressing Uygurs and Muslims in China's northwestern Xinjiang Province? The report points out that in 2003, China imprisoned hundreds of thousands of its own people without trial. This is evidence that the result of China's growing economic prosperity and national power has merely been to let a small, corrupt clutch of leaders and their families enjoy the fruits of reform and deregulation, while the Communist Party's monopoly on power and willful disregard for human rights remains unchanged.
If former Chinese president Jiang Zemin (
Furthermore, there was no need for Jiang's successors Hu Jintao (
Rice should see through Beijing's two-faced strategy and realize that in China's repressive regime, there is no such a thing as an enlightened leader. They are all a bunch of thugs whose paramount interest is to preserve the CCP's stranglehold on power. Beijing's autocrats will not risk losing their cherished monopoly on power by introducing a democratic electoral system.
The US State Department used to harbor the wishful view that China could be peacefully transformed. The belligerent content of the "anti-secession" law shows just how naive and preposterous that idea really is.
Saudi Arabian largesse is flooding Egypt’s cultural scene, but the reception is mixed. Some welcome new “cooperation” between two regional powerhouses, while others fear a hostile takeover by Riyadh. In Cairo, historically the cultural capital of the Arab world, Egyptian Minister of Culture Nevine al-Kilany recently hosted Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority chairman Turki al-Sheikh. The deep-pocketed al-Sheikh has emerged as a Medici-like patron for Egypt’s cultural elite, courted by Cairo’s top talent to produce a slew of forthcoming films. A new three-way agreement between al-Sheikh, Kilany and United Media Services — a multi-media conglomerate linked to state intelligence that owns much of
The US and other countries should take concrete steps to confront the threats from Beijing to avoid war, US Representative Mario Diaz-Balart said in an interview with Voice of America on March 13. The US should use “every diplomatic economic tool at our disposal to treat China as what it is... to avoid war,” Diaz-Balart said. Giving an example of what the US could do, he said that it has to be more aggressive in its military sales to Taiwan. Actions by cross-party US lawmakers in the past few years such as meeting with Taiwanese officials in Washington and Taipei, and
The Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan has no official diplomatic allies in the EU. With the exception of the Vatican, it has no official allies in Europe at all. This does not prevent the ROC — Taiwan — from having close relations with EU member states and other European countries. The exact nature of the relationship does bear revisiting, if only to clarify what is a very complicated and sensitive idea, the details of which leave considerable room for misunderstanding, misrepresentation and disagreement. Only this week, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) received members of the European Parliament’s Delegation for Relations
Denmark’s “one China” policy more and more resembles Beijing’s “one China” principle. At least, this is how things appear. In recent interactions with the Danish state, such as applying for residency permits, a Taiwanese’s nationality would be listed as “China.” That designation occurs for a Taiwanese student coming to Denmark or a Danish citizen arriving in Denmark with, for example, their Taiwanese partner. Details of this were published on Sunday in an article in the Danish daily Berlingske written by Alexander Sjoberg and Tobias Reinwald. The pretext for this new practice is that Denmark does not recognize Taiwan as a state under