President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) proposal for a possible peace accord with China within a 10-year time frame could put Taiwan’s sovereignty and democratic values at risk and leave future generations with no freedom of choice, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) said yesterday.
Speaking as the head of her party, Tsai, the DPP’s presidential candidate in January’s election, told a press conference that Ma’s proposal was “irresponsible and impetuous” and that it amounted to the manipulation of a highly sensitive political issue to cover up his administration’s failures, as well as a bargaining chip that benefits his presidential campaign.
“It’s a pity that President Ma, as a national leader, has put the nation’s future at risk with this reckless initiative and pushed the future of Taiwanese into a political danger zone,” Tsai said.
Photo: CNA
Ma proposed on Tuesday that Taiwan could negotiate a peace accord with China within 10 years on the preconditions of strong domestic support, the needs of the country and legislative supervision.
A DPP Central Standing Committee resolution yesterday said the proposal exposed Taiwanese to four serious risks — the sacrifice of Taiwan’s sovereignty, a change in the “status quo” across the Taiwan Strait, the jeopardizing of Taiwan’s democratic values and damage to the nation’s strategic depth in bilateral negotiations — Tsai said.
The initiative could make the cross-strait situation a “domestic” issue by agreeing to the “one China” principle, she said, as well as going to the negotiating table without a public mandate and a national consensus.
Tsai cited the 1951 peace deal between Tibet and China as an example of Beijing’s lack of credibility as a signatory.
“China is not a democratic country to this day. We cannot afford to overlook the potential risks and instability [when signing a peace accord with China],” she said.
Tsai said that while her party was not opposed to “political talks, without political preconditions,” any political negotiation should safeguard Taiwan’s sovereignty, democracy and peace.
Meanwhile, former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), who is serving a 17-and-a-half-year sentence for corruption, wrote in an article published yesterday that Taiwanese should never accept “one China,” adding that even former US president Bill Clinton had doubts about a potential cross-strait peace agreement.
Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) made it clear in a Dec. 31, 2008, speech that all cross-strait negotiations — including those for a confidence-building mechanism, the small three links, trade agreements, Taiwan’s international participation, as well as cessation of hostilities — should be under a “one China” framework, Chen said.
Ma had discussed the issue of a peace accord with him in 2007 and on April 1, 2008, when he was president-elect, Chen wrote.
Chen said he opposed any talks with preconditions and that he had had a heated debate with Ma on the so-called “1992 consensus” and “one China, with different interpretations.”
Ma said at the time that he would not hold talks with China if Beijing did not accept “one China, with different interpretations” and that he would not negotiate a peace agreement if China did not dismantle the missiles it has aimed at Taiwan, Chen wrote.
Current estimates put the number of short and medium-range, and cruise missiles the People’s Liberation Army targets at Taiwan at about 1,500.
Chen said he had rejected a recommendation by Ken Lieberthal, who served in the US National Security Council during the Clinton administration, for a mid-term peace treaty, which the US official argued would maintain peace across the Taiwan Strait for another 30 to 50 years.
The reason he rejected the proposal, he said, was that he would not accept the “one China” framework.
Clinton ridiculed Lieberthal’s proposal during his visit to Taiwan in February 2007, saying nobody could guarantee peace and that “time is on Taiwan’s side,” Chen wrote.
PROVOCATIVE: Chinese Deputy Ambassador to the UN Sun Lei accused Japan of sending military vessels to deliberately provoke tensions in the Taiwan Strait China denounced remarks by Japan and the EU about the South China Sea at a UN Security Council meeting on Monday, and accused Tokyo of provocative behavior in the Taiwan Strait and planning military expansion. Ayano Kunimitsu, a Japanese vice foreign minister, told the Council meeting on maritime security that Tokyo was seriously concerned about the situation in the East China and South China seas, and reiterated Japan’s opposition to any attempt to change the “status quo” by force, and obstruction of freedom of navigation and overflight. Stavros Lambrinidis, head of the EU delegation to the UN, also highlighted South China Sea
SILENCING CRITICS: In addition to blocking Taiwan, China aimed to prevent rights activists from speaking out against authoritarian states, a Cabinet department said The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday condemned transnational repression by Beijing after RightsCon, a major digital human rights conference scheduled to be held in Zambia this week, was abruptly canceled due to Chinese pressure over Taiwanese participation. This year’s RightsCon, the world’s largest conference discussing issues “at the intersection of human rights and technology,” was scheduled to take place from tomorrow to Friday in Lusaka, and expected to draw 2,600 in-person attendees from 150 countries, along with 1,100 online participants. However, organizers were forced to cancel the event due to behind-the-scenes pressure from China, the ministry said, expressing its “strongest condemnation”
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, said it expects its 2-nanometer (2nm) chip capacity to grow at a compound annual rate of 70 percent from this year to 2028. The projection comes as five fabs begin volume production of 2-nanometer chips this year — two in Hsinchu and three in Kaohsiung — TSMC senior vice president and deputy cochief operating officer Cliff Hou (侯永清) said at the company’s annual technology symposium in Silicon Valley, California, last week. Output in the first year of 2-nanometer production, which began in the fourth quarter of last year, is expected to
Taiwan’s economy grew far faster than expected in the first quarter, as booming demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications drove a surge in exports, spilling over into investment and consumption, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. GDP growth was 13.69 percent year-on-year during the January-to-March period, beating the DGBAS’ February forecast by 2.23 percentage points and marking the most robust growth in nearly four decades, DGBAS senior official Chiang Hsin-yi (江心怡) told a news conference in Taipei. The result was powered by exports, which remain the backbone of Taiwan’s economy, Chiang said. Outbound shipments jumped 51.12 percent year-on-year to
RSS