UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 has nothing to do with Taiwan, and it is downright despicable of China to attempt to obscure the issue by linking the resolution to its false claim that Taiwan is a part of China.
Adopted by the UN General Assembly on Oct. 25, 1971, Resolution 2758 recognized the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole legal government of China, replacing the Republic of China (ROC).
The exact wording is: “[The UN decides] to expel forthwith the representatives of Chiang Kai-shek [蔣介石] from the place which they unlawfully occupy at the UN and in all the organizations related to it.”
By unseating “the second China,” then represented by Chiang’s regime, what the resolution accomplished was resolving the question of the right of who represented China. Nowhere in the resolution is Taiwan mentioned; it did not address the issue of Taiwan’s representation, let alone explicitly or implicitly recognize the PRC’s territorial claim to Taiwan.
Thus the WHO’s wrongful interpretation of the resolution in favor of China over Taiwan, as evidenced by its mention of the resolution and the “one China” principle in its invitation to Taiwan to attend the World Health Assembly (WHA) this month, is ultimately shameful.
The invitation to “Dr Chiang” — Minister of Health and Welfare Chiang Been-huang (蔣丙煌) — from WHO Director-General Margaret Chan (陳馮富珍), includes the phrase “recalling the UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 (XXVI) and WHA Resolution 25.1 [which expelled the ROC from the WHO in 1972] and in line with the ‘one China’ principle as reflected therein.”
The incident comes across as yet another brazenly sneaky attempt by Beijing to distort the resolution as it tries to justify its territorial claims over Taiwan.
This is not the first time China, via the hands of others, has employed such a dirty trick in its attempts to tie Taiwan’s hands and deny Taiwan an international presence.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in July 2007 rejected Taiwan’s UN membership application by repeating Beijing’s claim that “Taiwan is an inalienable part of China’s territory.” He cited UN Resolution 2758 and added: “In accordance with that resolution, the United Nations considers Taiwan for all purposes to be an integral part of the People’s Republic of China.”
The US objected to Ban’s distorted reasoning and Washington “urged the UN Secretariat to review its policy on the status of Taiwan and to avoid taking sides in a sensitive matter on which UN members have agreed to disagree for over 35 years.”
“If the UN Secretariat insists on describing Taiwan as a part of the PRC, or on using nomenclature for Taiwan that implies such status, the United States will be obliged to disassociate itself on a national basis from such a position. It is crystal clear of US policy on Taiwan,” it added.
In 2011, then-US secretary of health and human services Kathleen Sebelius spoke up for Taiwan, saying that no UN agency had the right to unilaterally determine Taiwan’s status.
Indeed, no single international organization, the UN included, can unilaterally decide Taiwan’s standing, nor should China be given the ultimate say on the international stage to unilaterally decide Taiwan’s participation in global organizations.
However, it can be expected that China will continue trying to trick the international community into believing that Resolution 2758 binds Taiwan to it.
The incoming Democratic Progressive Party administration must heed the impact of Beijing’s distorted reasoning and take care not to give the international community any idea that it is acceptable to have Resolution 2758 made applicable to contemporary Taiwan.
The Executive Yuan recently revised a page of its Web site on ethnic groups in Taiwan, replacing the term “Han” (漢族) with “the rest of the population.” The page, which was updated on March 24, describes the composition of Taiwan’s registered households as indigenous (2.5 percent), foreign origin (1.2 percent) and the rest of the population (96.2 percent). The change was picked up by a social media user and amplified by local media, sparking heated discussion over the weekend. The pan-blue and pro-China camp called it a politically motivated desinicization attempt to obscure the Han Chinese ethnicity of most Taiwanese.
On Wednesday last week, the Rossiyskaya Gazeta published an article by Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) asserting the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) territorial claim over Taiwan effective 1945, predicated upon instruments such as the 1943 Cairo Declaration and the 1945 Potsdam Proclamation. The article further contended that this de jure and de facto status was subsequently reaffirmed by UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 of 1971. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs promptly issued a statement categorically repudiating these assertions. In addition to the reasons put forward by the ministry, I believe that China’s assertions are open to questions in international
The Legislative Yuan passed an amendment on Friday last week to add four national holidays and make Workers’ Day a national holiday for all sectors — a move referred to as “four plus one.” The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), who used their combined legislative majority to push the bill through its third reading, claim the holidays were chosen based on their inherent significance and social relevance. However, in passing the amendment, they have stuck to the traditional mindset of taking a holiday just for the sake of it, failing to make good use of
As strategic tensions escalate across the vast Indo-Pacific region, Taiwan has emerged as more than a potential flashpoint. It is the fulcrum upon which the credibility of the evolving American-led strategy of integrated deterrence now rests. How the US and regional powers like Japan respond to Taiwan’s defense, and how credible the deterrent against Chinese aggression proves to be, will profoundly shape the Indo-Pacific security architecture for years to come. A successful defense of Taiwan through strengthened deterrence in the Indo-Pacific would enhance the credibility of the US-led alliance system and underpin America’s global preeminence, while a failure of integrated deterrence would
RSS