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Taiwan's real 'fruitful' diplomacy

CHINA CONSIDERS this a "fruitful" year in terms of diplomacy, not least because, as the China Daily put it on Thursday, it "defeated Taiwan's attempt to join the WHO for the eleventh time."

But the questions remain: Is it really fruitful to block 23 million Taiwanese from full access to the most recent and important health information coming from abroad?

Is it fruitful to limit cooperation between the WHO and Taiwan by keeping the country outside the Global Outbreak Alert Response Network when the first few days of a disease outbreak are crucial to preventing a pandemic?

The answer is obviously "no."

In an interdependent world facing global issues, a diplomacy defending mostly national and political interest at the expense of global common interest cannot be considered fruitful. This "zero sum game diplomacy" is used by several countries in areas like environment and health, but it is neither beneficial nor responsible.

Thinking in terms of common interests instead of egoist ones, the health diplomacy of Taiwan this year could be considered fruitful.

In response to the serious health threats of malaria, diarrhea and Rift Valley fever in Kenya, Taiwan in January sent its third health mission to help authorities control the diseases by providing spraying equipment, medicine, mosquito nets and laboratory expertise.

Aware of the urgent need to work globally, Taiwan in July reached a consensus with the International Medical Assistance Foundation on efforts to prevent and control major international diseases such as avian flu, malaria, Rift Valley fever, brain fever and AIDS. In August, two days after an earthquake measuring 8 on the Richter scale killed 450 people in Peru, Taiwan sent an emergency medical relief team to treat and care for the injured and to provide food and other materials to the victims.

In October, Taiwan bolstered its cooperation with six Pacific allies (Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Solomon Islands and Tuvalu) to improve medical service in the Pacific Ocean, notably by developing training exchange programs aimed at meeting the UN's Millennium Development Goals.

All of these examples of health diplomacy are fruitful in the sense that they're widely beneficial and work toward improving global health security. Nevertheless, this fruitfulness would be even greater and benefit even more people if Taiwan were able to fully participate in a global health that can ill afford to turn down a helping hand.

Vincent Rollet is a doctoral candidate in the Department of International Relations at the Institute of Political Science in Paris.
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