China’s application of “one country, two systems” in Hong Kong proves that it is inappropriate for Taiwan, Brookings Institution Taiwan Studies director and former American Institute in Taiwan chairman Richard Bush said.
The whole idea has become a “major obstacle” to China achieving its political objectives with respect to Taiwan, Bush told a Washington hearing into the future of democracy in Hong Kong held by the Congressional-Executive Commission on China.
The commision’s chairman, Senator Sherrod Brown, a Democrat, said that Bush had mentioned fears in the highest echelons of the Chinese government that Hong Kong might look too much like Taiwan in terms of democracy.
He asked Bush how the Hong Kong protests had impacted Taiwan.
“It is my impression that after the initial media coverage of the Hong Kong situation, public attention in Taiwan was diverted to other issues,” Bush said.
“What has happened in Hong Kong, and what is likely to happen in Hong Kong, only confirms a long-held belief that the two entities should not be treated under the same framework as China is trying to do,” he added.
Brown said news reports suggested that President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) had developed a closer friendship with China compared with former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁).
If Taiwan was moving toward “some kind of Chinese model,” Brown said, he wondered how the Hong Kong protests might affect the situation.
Bush said that what was happening in Hong Kong contributed to a trend that was already in play.
“The Ma administration and China have grabbed all the low-hanging fruit in terms of the sorts of cooperation they can get,” Bush said.
He said that Taiwanese politics had been immobilized earlier this year by the Sunflower movement.
“Where China would really like to go on cross-strait relations is political talks and President Ma has correctly been very wary of going down that road because he is very committed to the idea of the Republic of China,” Bush said. “And that is something that Beijing doesn’t want to talk about.”
Bush said that Ma, who was born in Hong Kong, came out a few weeks ago with a very strong statement in favor of democracy in Hong Kong and the peaceful protests going on there.
“Beijing was profoundly unhappy with his statement and felt that he was sticking his nose where it didn’t belong,” Bush said.
Asked by Brown if the Sunflower movement in Taiwan had served as a template for what was happening in Hong Kong, Bush said there had been a lot of interaction between activists “exchanging experiences and techniques.”
He said that the interaction could play into the China “narrative” that the Hong Kong protests were fueled by “a bunch of black hands from the US, Taiwan and so forth.”
However, the Hong Kong protests were “definitely homegrown,” he said.
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
NUMBERs IMBALANCE: More than 4 million Taiwanese have visited China this year, while only about half a million Chinese have visited here Beijing has yet to respond to Taiwan’s requests for negotiation over matters related to the recovery of cross-strait tourism, the Tourism Administration said yesterday. Taiwan’s tourism authority issued the statement after Chinese-language daily the China Times reported yesterday that the government’s policy of banning group tours to China does not stop Taiwanese from visiting the country. As of October, more than 4.2 million had traveled to China this year, exceeding last year. Beijing estimated the number of Taiwanese tourists in China could reach 4.5 million this year. By contrast, only 500,000 Chinese tourists are expected in Taiwan, the report said. The report
RSS