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China watches as ties grow between Taiwan, Israel

Taiwan and Israel are developing close trade and high-tech ties under the watchful eyes of China which fears Taipei and Tel Aviv are secretly nurturing political and military ties.

Since exchanging trade offices in 1993, Taiwan and Israel have doubled trade from US$500 million in 1997 to US$1 billion last year, with a strong emphasis on high-tech imports and exports.

The peak in bilateral trade occurred in 2004 when two-way trade rose 64 percent. Two-way trade last year hit US$1.3 billion, up 5 percent year-on-year, according to the Bureau of Foreign Trade.

Last month Taiwan and Israel signed a scientific and technological cooperation agreement to promote cooperation in high-tech fields.

"We hope to promote cooperation and research in areas like bio-technology, nanotechnology and life science. Israel will send a delegation to sign a working plan on how to carry out the cooperation pact," National Science Council official Lin Kuang-lung (林光隆) said.

The delegation, led by Acting Minister of Science and Technology Mina Teicher, was scheduled to arrive this month, but delayed the trip until April because Israel is scheduled to hold elections next month and has asked its ministers to stay home.

"Once the details have been worked out, we hope scientists from both sides can hold seminars so that they can decide how to carry out the exchanges," Lin added.

Israel is satisfied with its trade ties with Taiwan, but is wary of violating its "one China" policy and hurting its diplomatic ties with China, launched in 1992.

"The `one China' policy is a given policy, so we must respect it, but we can develop economic and trade ties because our economies complement each other," Ruth Kahanoff, Israel's trade representative to Taiwan, said in an interview.

Kahanoff said that promoting trade with Taiwan is a high priority for Israel because Taiwan is Israel's third-largest trading partner in Asia after China and Japan in terms of trade without diamonds.

Israeli exports to Taiwan last year totaled US$558 million, compared with US$615 million to China and US$600 million to India.

Israel counts its exports in two ways: with diamonds and without diamonds.

Trade-without-diamond figures are more accurate because diamond exports have little added-value as Israel imports diamonds and earns little from exporting cut diamonds.

Hovav Ref, economic affairs director of the Israel Economic and Cultural Office (ISECO) in Taipei, said that Taiwan and Israel complement each other because Israel is a leader in high-tech and research and development (R&D) while Taiwan has manufacturing capabilities.

"Israel spends 4.6 percent of its GDP on R&D, the highest in the world. Taiwan is good at manufacturing but many Taiwan companies have moved to China, so Taiwan is focusing on high-tech like biotech, semiconductors, etc," Ref said.

But to Taiwan, which is recognized by only 25 mostly small nations and is eager to break out of its international isolation, high-technology imports are not the only thing it wants from Israel.

Press reports said Taiwan wants to launch military ties with Israel and upgrade the level of its general ties with the Middle East country.

According to the reports, Taiwan bought 15 missile-equipped speedboats -- and was seeking to buy 40 Kfir warplanes -- from Israel in the 1980s and 1990s.

Taiwan's Tien Kung (sky bow) surface-to-air missile was modeled on Israel's Gabriel missile, the reports said.

"Israel is good at converting warplanes, electronics warfare, early-warning systems and UAV [unmanned aerial vehicles]. But no-one knows if we have military contacts with Israel," said Tang Feng, director of the Economic Ministry's Industrial Cooperation Program Office.

But China is watching closely, fearing that Israel's export of weapons or defense technology could embolden Taiwan to seek formal independence.

In 1995, former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) planned to make a secret visit to Israel, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) which all have diplomatic ties with China. He only visited Jordan and UAE because Israel canceled his visit under pressure from China.

Former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu (in office from 1996-1999) planned to visit Taiwan in 2001 to promote trade ties, but canceled the visit without giving a reason.

In the book, The Taiwan Issue in China's Foreign Relations (published in 2002), Chinese foreign affairs expert Tong Fei summarized Beijing's worries over Taiwan's diplomatic offensive in the Middle East.

Tong Fei said that Taiwan's expanding ties with Middle Eastern nations was to secure its oil supply, and sea and air passages to Central Asia and Europe, as well as to open trade ties and to upgrade these ties to official or semi-official levels.

But China has instructed its diplomatic allies to embrace the "one China" policy and bars them from launching official ties with Taiwan or allowing visits by Taiwan's leaders.
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