China and the US have over the years signed three joint communiques — the 1972 Shanghai Communique, the 1979 Joint Communique on the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations and the 1982 Communique.
Although Taiwan’s friends in the US insist that Washington and Beijing do not plan to sign a fourth communique, pan-blue media and officials in Taiwan have kept on harping about it and seized every opportunity to ask the US whether a fourth one is coming.
It is as if they were afraid that the issue of a communique might vanish from the US-China negotiating table. Of course, the Chinese government would like there to be a fourth.
At a time when the US’ “one China” policy is clearly tending toward “our one China” policy, implying a US interpretation that does not recognize Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan, Beijing would like to use a communique to move back to a “one China” policy that does not include the different interpretation implied by the word “our.”
Even former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) flew to the US, where he used his as status as a former president to refute what he called US President Donald Trump’s new “one China” policy.
Oddly enough, just at this sensitive moment, a draft law governing legislative oversight of cross-strait agreements has suddenly come back to life. The moribund bill’s new spark of life was supplied by the Economic Democracy Union, but it immediately gained a positive response from the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT).
The Legislative Yuan’s Internal Administration Committee then swiftly placed the bill on the agenda for deliberation. The odd thing is that the KMT has so far not proposed its own version of the bill, so its eagerness to get the bill onto the agenda suggests some ulterior motive.
It is not hard to figure out why the KMT is so keen. It is because the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) version of the bill completely accepts the “one country, two areas” formula and the definition of the nation as expressed in the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (台灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例).
This acceptance complies with the strategic demands that China can be expected to raise in the meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and US President Donald Trump that is expected to take place next month.
If the oversight bill were enacted according to the existing draft, it would immediately have the following undesirable effects:
First, being passed by a legislature that is controlled by a DPP government, this legislation would amount to telling the world that Taiwan accepts the idea that it is part of China. As a result, Beijing’s “one China” principle would gain wider acceptance than it already has in the international community.
Second, it would amount to a negation by Taiwan’s government of Trump’s “our one China policy.” China would then be sure to step up its pressure on the US to recognize Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan.
It would also lend legitimacy to pan-blue officials’ approach to Taiwan-friendly people in the US and would be enough to shake their Taiwan-friendly standpoints.
Third, it could therefore prompt China and the US to arrive at a fourth communique, in a replay of the steps that led to the Shanghai Communique in 1972.
Fourth, a political downfall would surely bring economic ruin in its wake.
It would indeed be a good thing to have an oversight law to strictly regulate all agreements with China. However, any such law must not fall into the “one China” trap.
The experience of more than a decade tells us that teaming up with China will only increase Taiwan’s marginalization.
Taiwan has enough agreements with China, so it should concentrate on investing in the economy and elevating its democracy to the next level. It would be better not to have any new agreements with China for the time being.
Where there is a will, there is a way. If the proposed oversight law is to be called the “act governing oversight of cross-strait agreements” it would be better to replace the words “cross-strait” with “international” and make it applicable to two different categories of agreement, namely those signed with diplomatic allies and their governments on the one hand and with non-diplomatic partners and their governments on the other.
Each of these categories would then be subject to different degrees of oversight. This would sort out the question of the bill’s title.
When deliberating the oversight bill, the Economic Democracy Union, as well as New Power Party and DPP legislators, should not talk lightly of “returning to the framework of the Republic of China Constitution,” and they must avoid the pitfall of using such terms as “the two sides of the Taiwan Strait,” “areas” and “both belonging to ‘one China.’”
Failure to follow this advice would have unthinkable consequences. In that case it would be better to set the bill aside for the time being to avoid setting Taiwan on a path to oblivion.
Huang Tien-lin is a national policy adviser and former managing director and chairman of the First Commercial Bank.
Translated by Julian Clegg
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