The dramatic standoff between dozens of Taiwanese fishing boats, Coast Guard Administration (CGA) vessels and Japanese patrol ships near the disputed Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) on Tuesday morning made global headlines and fueled speculation that President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration may have orchestrated the incident to divert attention from domestic issues or to do Beijing’s work. However, observers said that things are not that simple.
Following the announcement by Tokyo on Sept. 11 that it had nationalized three islets in the Diaoyutais — known as the Senkakus in Japan — Taipei and Beijing, which both claim the island chain, protested the move, which had generated violent demonstrations across China and a much smaller rally in Taipei on Sunday.
On Sept. 20, the Suao Fishermen’s Association in Yilan County announced that several dozen Taiwanese fishing boats would set sail for the Diaoyutais on Monday to protest against what they called Japan’s “illegal occupation” of the island group and “harassment of fishermen” around the islands.
Although the Yilan County Government, headed by Commissioner Lin Tsung-hsien (林聰賢) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), turned down a request for NT$5 million (US$170,000) in fuel subsidies for the fishermen, the sortie was eventually made possible by a donation of that amount by Want Want China Times Group chairman Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), who has often been portrayed as pro-China.
Also fueling speculation that the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) had plotted the sortie to create a diversion was the role played by Suao District 2 Administrator Hong Hsiu-tsao (洪秀璪) of the KMT, who took part in the event.
Hong told a Japanese reporter that the issue was not whether one likes Japan or not, but one of fishing rights.
However, Ketty Chen (陳婉宜), a political scientist at National Taiwan University who studies KMT political activity, says the requirement for politicians to meet the needs of their constituents, rather than directives from the central party committee or party ideology, helped explain Hong’s role.
“Even if the local KMT participated in the sortie, this does not mean that the KMT ‘orchestrated’ the whole thing,” she said, adding that fishermen constituencies have historically been close to the KMT.
“We therefore can’t assume that Ma told Hong to go,” Chen said.
Despite turning down the request for financial assistance, the county government sent rescue ships to assist with supplies, and in a statement, Lin, who reportedly had wanted to accompany the fishermen, but was barred by the DPP from doing so, commended the fishermen for their “bravery” and “determination.”
Again, this shows that “politicians will go where their constituents and supporters go,” Chen said.
Journalists who were present at Suao prior to the departure on Monday also reported that the fishermen said they were only interested in protecting their fishing rights and had little interest in China or politics. The T-shirts they wore and the banners on the boats carried messages about issues of livelihood and fishing rights, not sovereignty.
The Suao and Keelung fishermen’s associations also stayed clear of the protest in Taipei on Sunday, where about 1,500 people, including organizations calling for cross-strait cooperation, clamored for the Republic of China’s (ROC) sovereignty over the Diaoyutais.
Chen Chun-sheng (陳君聖), president of the Suao Fishermen’s Association in Yilan County, said last week that the association’s members had a different agenda, which was to secure their fishing rights.
The sovereignty issue should be handled by the government, he said.
The Chunghua Baodiao Alliance, a more nationalistic group with ties to Hong Kong and China, did not participate in the sortie, saying its presence would have complicated matters.
Meanwhile, in Taipei, the KMT and the Presidential Office commended the fishermen for their patriotism and emphasized the public’s initiative, casting doubt on the notion that Tuesday’s events were directed from Taipei.
The KMT was also conspicuously absent from the protest on Sunday.
Lin Yu-siang (林鈺祥), an adviser to the Institute for National Policy Research and a former KMT legislator, said KMT members did not want to align themselves with the protesters.
“Those are the pro-China, unificationists; it is not us,” he said.
The fishermen were out to protect their interests and for them the issue was not sovereignty, Lin Yu-siang said, adding that the KMT would not be able to motivate the fishermen to head to Diaoyutais to defend ROC sovereignty “even if they paid them NT$100 million.”
Although the central government could have prevented the fishermen from heading for the Diaoyutais, as it has done in the past, local pressure from fishermen’s associations compelled it to allow them to set sail. After that, the government had no choice but to dispatch coast guard vessels to ensure their safety.
“What is the coast guard supposed to do in such a case, nothing?” Chen asked.
Tsai’s donation to the fishermen also spoke more to his roots than ideology. The Yilan-born entrepreneur, who prior to making his fortune in the crackers business worked in the canned fish industry, said he provided the money because people should not regard Taiwanese as “weaklings.”
Never missing an opportunity, Tsai also had a company banner affixed to one of the boats.
Lin Yu-siang said the fishermen committed a strategic error bt accepting money from Tsai because of his close association with China. Taking money from Tsai gives the Japanese and the pan-green camp the excuse to imply that China was behind the whole thing and that Ma is doing China’s dirty work, he said.
All of this shows that the issue is very complex, with overlapping and sometimes conflicting mandates, Chen said.
“It’s not black and white,” 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:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater