The true test for the success of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government is two-fold: whether it can lift the country’s economy without resorting to corruption, and whether China will make concessions in response to increased cross-strait exchanges, said Graham Watson, the leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe in the European Parliament, in an interview with the Taipei Times on Tuesday.
Watson came to Taipei with an eight-person delegation from the parliament’s liberal group.
While the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) tried to establish more freedom and independence, the KMT wants to achieve the same thing through better relations with China, he said.
“I don’t know who’s right, we will see, but if the cross-strait policy of the current government is working well, then it will soon lead to meaningful participation for Taiwan in bodies such as the WHO because there should be some movement on the side of the PRC [People’s Republic of China], it should not only be movements on the Taiwan side,” he said.
“The tests would be fundamentally two things: One, can [the KMT] manage the economy properly without corruption coming back in, as was the case when they were last in power, and second, will their policy of closer relationships across the Strait lead to concessions by China towards Taiwan?” he said.
Watson said he had visited Taiwan at least eight times and “the reason for doing this is to show members of the European Parliament how impressive Taiwan’s achievements are, not only economically but also in terms of social development, [such as] the development of democracy since the lifting of martial law 21 years ago.”
Saying that he earlier had a good meeting with President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), Watson said Ma was “clearly a new-style Chinese Nationalist Party” member who is a good communicator and will represent Taiwan well to the outside world.
“[However,] in politics the test for all of us is how much we can convince our own people, and that will be his job for the next four years,” Watson said.
“[The improvement of relations between KMT and China] is a remarkable development,” Watson said. “President Ma stressed to us during our meeting that there would be no reunification — he also said no independence of course — [and] we must give the new government the chance to prove themselves.”
Watson also discussed Taiwan’s participation in international forums.
“It is our view that you cannot exclude a country as important as Taiwan from meaningful participation in things like world health talks … It makes sense that Taiwan should be involved in the WHO and I hope that the improvement in cross-strait relations will help achieve that.”
As for his thoughts on the opening of direct cross-strait flights across the Strait, Watson said: “Taiwan is already [economically] dependent on China — with US$60 billion worth of investment there. A good long-term strategy for Taiwan would be to diversify investments [from China] to other countries.”
Watson suggested Taiwan also needed to invest more in education so that it can better manage the transition from a manufacturing economy to a service economy.
Asked his views on reports of policemen reportedly trying to snatch national flags from civilians during the recent visit of a Chinese envoy, as well as the ensuing Wild Strawberry demonstration, Watson said in a democracy there has to be freedom for demonstrations.
“It’s very difficult for me to judge [the status of human rights] from outside the country, but I think everybody would recognize that Taiwan is much freer than most countries in Asia,” he said. “[As is the case with other democratic counties,] students are often in the vanguard of movements for civil freedom, [and] you have a vibrant democracy here.”
“If governments do not respond to public concern, in the end they are voted out of office. And that must be [Ma’s] choice how far he responds,” he said.
Watson said the delegation also talked with local politicians about opening up of government procurement policy to European countries, the issue of death penalty and the issue of visa waiver.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods