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Green groups say no to China's panda diplomacy

As the selection of Taiwan's pandas reaches its final stages in China, humanistic and environmental groups in Taiwan yesterday raised objections about Taiwan's acceptance of the pandas, questioning whether China's gesture is really one of goodwill and whether the pandas will improve ecological understanding in Taiwan.

Speaking of what China's gesture might represent, Chu Tseng-hung (朱增宏), president of the Environment and Animal Society of Taiwan (East), said, "First, it may be a peacemaking gesture. Second, the zoo has emphasized that it is for research, protection and environmental education purposes. But we need to ask: How sincere is it as a symbol of peacemaking, and is it appropriate for research needs of Taiwan's ecologists?"

Shortly after former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman, Lien Chan's (連戰) visit to China at the end of April this year, China offered Taiwan a pair of pandas as a gift, an offer which has raised much controversy.

Executive director of Taiwan's Humanistic Education Foundation, Joanna Feng (馮喬蘭) said, "Some have joked that with the pandas in Taiwan, there may be two less missiles aimed at Taiwan. But in the past, China has referred to Taiwan as being its flesh and blood, but that hasn't stopped them from aiming their missiles at us. So I don't see how two pandas can help."

Feng spoke of the less-than-ideal conditions in which captive pandas in China were kept, saying that China only cared about manufacturing pandas by the dozen, treating them as commodities and using them as strategic devices.

During the cold war, China famously gave pandas as tokens of goodwill, leading to the term "panda diplomacy" being coined. The recipients of such tokens of goodwill included Japan, the US and Britain.

Telling how China suppressed Taiwan during this year's UN non-governmental organizations (NGO) conference, which resulted in Taiwan's representative not being allowed to go to important meetings, executive director of the Peacetime Foundation of Taiwan, Chien Hsi-chieh said, "If China really wants to show goodwill toward Taiwan, they should start by allowing NGOs more space to participate internationally."

From an ecological perspective, Chien said that moving the pandas to Taiwan was not the right way forward.

"Protecting them in their natural habitat is the future of ecological conservation," Chien said.

Chien added that moving the pandas to Taiwan would reduce their activity space, from 24,000m2 to only 5500m2, and that the life expectancy of caged pandas was two to three years shorter than of those living in the wild.

Chien said, "The best thing the government can do is leave the pandas in their natural habitat and use the NT$200 million (US$6 million) that was going to be used to build the panda center in Taiwan for their maintenance in China."

Feng said, "It is not just a question of whether Taiwan has the ability to keep pandas, it has also to do with if Taiwan wants to adopt a more progressive and humane attitude, one that places value on life."

The Wild at Heart Legal Defense Association, Taiwan's, Lynn Lin (林子凌) spoke of how, after explaining to students of Longan elementary school that having pandas moved to Taiwan would mean they had to leave their natural habitat, the students' original excitement about having pandas in Taiwan dissipated, and all consequently voted that the bears should stay in China.

"Why are our adults less reasonable than these children? Why does the government insist on sacrificing two lives, in spite of principles which take only five minutes to explain?" Lin said.

Getting these students to petition against the move maybe the next step, Lin said.
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