Determining Taiwan’s status
The rationale behind the case of Roger Lin (林志昇) et al v the US (“Taiwanese in US flock to sovereignty trial,” Feb. 7, page 3) has been discussed in your letters column over the past several years, always resulting in a vigorous round of rebuttals and denials from readers.
Many readers have argued that Taiwan was never invaded by the US and that Japanese troops in Taiwan surrendered to Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石), who was a representative of the Allies. They also said the specification of a “principal occupying Power” in Article 23(a) of the San Francisco Peace Treaty (SFPT) has nothing to do with Taiwan.
The concept of “invasion” is not limited to ground troops — bombardment by airplanes and ships also qualifies.
The US’ status as the “principal occupying Power” over Taiwan is expected since all attacks against (Japanese) Taiwan during World War II were conducted by US forces.
Rights and obligations for the occupied territory fall to “the (principal) occupying Power” — the “conqueror.”
By contrast, neither The Hague nor the Geneva Conventions accord any status to the “troops that accept the surrender.”
Four facts are key: One, none of the Allies recognized any transfer of the sovereignty of Taiwan to China at the time of the Oct. 25, 1945, Japanese surrender ceremonies.
Two, the mass naturalization of native Taiwanese people as Republic of China (ROC) nationals/citizens in January 1946, during a period of belligerent occupation, is illegal under international law.
Three, the 1952 post-war peace treaties did not award the sovereignty of Taiwan to China. As a result, native Taiwanese people are today without an internationally recognized nationality.
Four, military government is “the form of administration by which an occupying power exercises governmental authority over occupied territory.”
SFPT Article 4(b) asserts the validity of the US Military Government (USMG) directives pertaining to Article 2 and Article 3 territories — including Taiwan. Such a specification confirms that USMG jurisdiction over Taiwan is active.
My lawsuit seeks declarations that native Taiwanese people have “rights under the US Constitution” resulting from the treaty specifications.
In Saturday’s story it was suggested that some Taiwanese groups feel this lawsuit conflicts with the goal of Taiwanese independence. I don’t believe this is a valid criticism.
The nation’s various “pro-independence groups” have never produced a unanimous statement on Taiwan’s current international legal status.
As a result, their efforts mainly consist of trying to enable Taiwan to become “independent” from China (the ROC or the People’s Republic of China). However, such efforts are doomed to failure. My lawsuit clarifies the facts for all the world to see — Taiwan is an overseas territory under the jurisdiction of the USMG.
As an occupied territory, Taiwan has not yet reached a “final political status” — it is “undetermined.” The logic is straightforward.
Native Taiwanese people are entitled to hold passports of the SFPT’s principal occupying Power — the US. The Taiwanese public’s desire for self-government can only be achieved by first recognizing their current situation.
ROGER LIN
Taipei
When Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) sits down with US President Donald Trump in Beijing on Thursday next week, Xi is unlikely to demand a dramatic public betrayal of Taiwan. He does not need to. Beijing’s preferred victory is smaller, quieter and in some ways far more dangerous: a subtle shift in American wording that appears technical, but carries major strategic meaning. The ask is simple: replace the longstanding US formulation that Washington “does not support Taiwan independence” with a harder one — that Washington “opposes” Taiwan independence. One word changes; a deterrence structure built over decades begins to shift.
Taipei is facing a severe rat infestation, and the city government is reportedly considering large-scale use of rodenticides as its primary control measure. However, this move could trigger an ecological disaster, including mass deaths of birds of prey. In the past, black kites, relatives of eagles, took more than three decades to return to the skies above the Taipei Basin. Taiwan’s black kite population was nearly wiped out by the combined effects of habitat destruction, pesticides and rodenticides. By 1992, fewer than 200 black kites remained on the island. Fortunately, thanks to more than 30 years of collective effort to preserve their remaining
After Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) met Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in Beijing, most headlines referred to her as the leader of the opposition in Taiwan. Is she really, though? Being the chairwoman of the KMT does not automatically translate into being the leader of the opposition in the sense that most foreign readers would understand it. “Leader of the opposition” is a very British term. It applies to the Westminster system of parliamentary democracy, and to some extent, to other democracies. If you look at the UK right now, Conservative Party head Kemi Badenoch is
A Pale View of Hills, a movie released last year, follows the story of a Japanese woman from Nagasaki who moved to Britain in the 1950s with her British husband and daughter from a previous marriage. The daughter was born at a time when memories of the US atomic bombing of Nagasaki during World War II and anxiety over the effects of nuclear radiation still haunted the community. It is a reflection on the legacy of the local and national trauma of the bombing that ended the period of Japanese militarism. A central theme of the movie is the need, at
RSS