Taiwan is not only passive on cross-strait matters, it is at an impasse. Academics from Chinese think tanks made loud calls at a recent seminar in Taiwan for the two sides to begin political talks, while Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) proposed launching talks on a peace accord when meeting former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Lien Chan (連戰) at the APEC summit in Singapore.
Although neither a memorandum of understanding nor an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) has been signed, it is undeniable that China has an economic unification strategy.
Not satisfied with its progress toward economic unification, China hopes to move on to political talks. Is President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) ready? During his election campaign, Ma mentioned a peace framework. The government recognizes the “one China” principle and is willing to engage in cross-strait political negotiations. Members of the Democratic Progressive Party have said that Ma wants to sign a peace agreement before the end of his term in 2012 in hopes that he and Hu would win the Nobel Peace Prize.
The Ma administration’s submissive attitude toward China has caused public discontent. Lien participated in this year’s APEC summit as a special envoy of a member state, and his meeting with Hu was deliberately arranged to take place after a meeting between Hu and Hong Kong Chief Executive Donald Tsang (曾蔭權). The Lien-Hu meeting was on a party-to-party basis rather than on an equal footing between APEC members.
China is trying to give the impression that Taiwan is on the same level as Hong Kong and Macau. The Ma administration’s failure to object to this is unacceptable.
China and the Ma administration have misjudged Taiwanese public opinion and overestimated public support for Ma and the KMT. Ma’s approval ratings have hovered between 20 percent and 40 percent since the Morakot disaster. The Presidential Office has incited a strong backlash by its handling of US beef imports while trying to force through an ECFA with China. The KMT has been rattled by vote-buying allegations after its Central Standing Committee poll, the premier is fending off allegations that he has links to gangsters, several KMT legislators have lost their seats for vote buying and a top party hack has been caught having an extramarital affair. These events are draining the government and the legislature of their strength. The KMT will face massive opposition in the next month’s elections as the public reacts to the government’s mistakes. With the DPP now recovering from the scandals surrounding former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), the KMT cannot be sure of winning the next legislative or presidential elections.
The KMT does not wield the total power it claims and it cannot do as it pleases on every political issue. Given the Taiwanese public’s skepticism toward China, if Beijing thinks the Ma administration is weak and wants to force early cross-strait talks on political issues, it will not be able to help the KMT consolidate its leadership or bring about unification. Instead, they will force the Ma government onto the road of political destruction.
In recent weeks, Taiwan has witnessed a surge of public anxiety over the possible introduction of Indian migrant workers. What began as a policy signal from the Ministry of Labor quickly escalated into a broader controversy. Petitions gathered thousands of signatures within days, political figures issued strong warnings, and social media became saturated with concerns about public safety and social stability. At first glance, this appears to be a straightforward policy question: Should Taiwan introduce Indian migrant workers or not? However, this framing is misleading. The current debate is not fundamentally about India. It is about Taiwan’s labor system, its
Japan’s imminent easing of arms export rules has sparked strong interest from Warsaw to Manila, Reuters reporting found, as US President Donald Trump wavers on security commitments to allies, and the wars in Iran and Ukraine strain US weapons supplies. Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s ruling party approved the changes this week as she tries to invigorate the pacifist country’s military industrial base. Her government would formally adopt the new rules as soon as this month, three Japanese government officials told Reuters. Despite largely isolating itself from global arms markets since World War II, Japan spends enough on its own
On March 31, the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs released declassified diplomatic records from 1995 that drew wide domestic media attention. One revelation stood out: North Korea had once raised the possibility of diplomatic relations with Taiwan. In a meeting with visiting Chinese officials in May 1995, as then-Chinese president Jiang Zemin (江澤民) prepared for a visit to South Korea, North Korean officials objected to Beijing’s growing ties with Seoul and raised Taiwan directly. According to the newly released records, North Korean officials asked why Pyongyang should refrain from developing relations with Taiwan while China and South Korea were expanding high-level
Minister of Labor Hung Sun-han (洪申翰) on April 9 said that the first group of Indian workers could arrive as early as this year as part of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the Taipei Economic and Cultural Center in India and the India Taipei Association. Signed in February 2024, the MOU stipulates that Taipei would decide the number of migrant workers and which industries would employ them, while New Delhi would manage recruitment and training. Employment would be governed by the laws of both countries. Months after its signing, the two sides agreed that 1,000 migrant workers from India would
RSS