Following President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) Jan. 28 visit to Itu Aba Island (Taiping Island, 太平島) in the Spratly Islands (Nansha Islands, 南沙群島), the Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement saying that the visit was “like the owner of a house going from upstairs to downstairs.”
That would have been true if Ma had visited Kaohsiung, in which case the ministry would not have wasted reporting the trip to the US, but it did notify the US beforehand, so the ministry knows that visiting Itu Aba and Kaohsiung are not the same thing.
What displeased the US over the trip was not Taiwan’s claim of sovereignty over Itu Aba, but Ma’s insistence on visiting the island, whose sovereignty is disputed, at a time when the situation in the South China Sea is tense and Washington is putting pressure on Beijing over its construction of artificial islands in the region. From the US point of view, Ma’s visit at such a time could be seen as complementing China’s opposition to the US.
Washington reacted more strongly to Ma’s visit to Itu Aba than it did when former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) went there. The ministry said this is because the disputes over sovereignty in the region have grown sharper. However, that is probably not the only reason.
Taiwan, China, the Philippines, Vietnam and Brunei are all claimant nations to various islands in the South China Sea, and Chen’s Taiwan-based stance complied with the US perspective.
Ma, on the other hand, has given up Taiwan’s sovereignty and accepted the “one China” principle. The argument Ma put forward to justify his claim of sovereignty is based on the Western Han Dynasty, since he says the islands have been Chinese territory “since ancient times.”
The historical discourse is the same as that put forward by China, which praised Ma for joining it to protect “the ancestral property of the Chinese nation.” The praise underlines Ma’s standpoint of working hard to serve China while eroding Taiwan’s identity.
The grounds by which Taiwan claims sovereignty over Itu Aba is the principle of “first and continuous possession,” which has nothing to do with China. Before World War II, the Spratly Islands were occupied by France. During the war, they came under Japanese occupation. After the war, Itu Aba was occupied by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government, which withdrew its garrison from the island for a while after it went into exile in Taiwan, but started stationing personnel there again in 1967.
Article 2, Paragraph F, of the 1951 Treaty of San Francisco states that “Japan renounces all right, title and claim to Taiwan and the Pescadores [Penghu],” but it does not state which nation would receive ownership of the islands. China and Vietnam responded by putting forward claims of sovereignty, and the Philippines added its claim in 1955, based on geographical factors.
Chen put forward a Taiwan-themed sovereignty claim, making Taiwan a claimant state on a level footing with China.
Ma, in contrast, clings to the “one China” principle and adheres to a Chinese historical discourse, which weakens Taiwan’s position as a claimant. While Ma clings to China’s skirt, how can he accuse others of trying to hold him back?
James Wang is a media commentator.
Translated by Julian Clegg
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