Vice President Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) warned yesterday of Beijing's new approaches toward Taiwan and urged the public to stay on high alert against China's "trap."
Lu made the comments while giving a speech at the opening of an international conference on cross-strait exchanges and Taiwan's national security sponsored by Taiwan Advocates -- a pro-independence group dedicated to Taiwan's cause.
On the political front, Lu said, the Beijing regime will continue to isolate Taiwan in the international community and intimidate Taiwan indirectly by putting strong pressure on the US.
According to the vice president, a Shanghai-based think tank led by Wang Daohan (
On the military front, Lu went on, Beijing's strategy toward Taiwan is based on three major tactics -- attack, blockade and invasion. As the Beijing regime has repeatedly voiced its determination to resolve the Taiwan problem through military means, China's military authorities are in favor of setting a timetable to settle the issue, she said.
According to the vice president, the Chinese communists would first attack Taiwan proper and its offshore islands to paralyze Taiwan's leadership and destroy its information system before blockading the nation.
They would then force Taiwan to the negotiating table by creating chaos before sending their joint armed forces to invade, she said.
Since last year, Beijing has tried every possible means to underscore its sovereignty claim over the Taiwan Strait, Lu said. Pointing to a military exercise held last year by China authorities as example, she said China's naval vessels detoured purposely first to international waters some 100km off Taiwan's eastern coast before heading for Hainan Island.
Chinese authorities also protested last year to Australia over passage by Australian naval vessels through the Taiwan Strait on their way home after a joint military drill in South Korea, Lu said, adding that the repeated appearances of China's scientific research ships off Taiwan are also proof that Beijing seeks to make the world believe that the Strait is under its jurisdiction.
In view of China's relentless and renewed two-pronged strategy toward Taiwan, she called on the Taiwanese people to heighten their alert in order not to fall into Beijing's trap while Taiwan-China ties are still mired in stalemate, with many risks and uncertainties.
With the beginning of a new century, Lu nevertheless encouraged the Taiwanese people to resist China's leverage and effects by looking toward the eastern Pacific and shifting some of their attention and energy from the Taiwan Strait to the rest of the world.
"Taiwan must reach out to become a Taiwan for the whole world, " she said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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