Cross-strait academics have called China’s reported plan to merge its Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) with its Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office (HKMAO) an example of the country portraying issues related to Taiwan and the two Chinese territories as “local” affairs.
Hong Kong Chinese-language daily Ming Pao on Friday reported that China is to merge several government agencies, including the TAO and HKMAO.
One reason for Beijing to merge the two agencies could be that a stronger link between Hong Kong and Taiwan on many issues has developed before and following the territory’s Occupy Central movement, National Chengchi University Institute of International Relations director Kou Chien-wen (寇健文) said, adding that Hong Kong relations have already entered a new phase.
Under these circumstances, Beijing needs to improve the coordination of its relations with Taiwan and the territory, which are currently managed by separate agencies, he said, adding that merging the two would meet this need.
Hong Kong and Macau relations are local affairs under Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework, and merging the TAO and HKMAO would send out the message that Beijing is “localizing” the “Taiwan problem,” Kou said.
Merging the two offices would be a huge change, said Chang Wu-yueh (張五岳), an associate professor in Tamkang University’s Graduate Institute of China Studies.
It would mean nominally integrating Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau, he said, adding that China’s intention of including Taiwan under the “one country, two systems” framework is clear.
There are differences between Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping’s (鄧小平) interpretations of the “one country, two systems” framework proposed by the latter, Chang said.
Xi’s “one country, two systems” framework appears to represent a different idea, Chang said.
Xi’s framework emphasizes that the two sides should each mind their own business, that China is to share the fruits of its development with Taiwanese and that there should be a “spiritual agreement” between the two, Chang said.
Whether the offices’ rumored merger would benefit China’s fight against Taiwanese independence and Hong Kong independence campaigners is “a very secondary question.”
The two situations are not alike, Chang said, adding, for example, that many pro-Hong Kong independence campaigners do not believe that the movement could succeed.
To Beijing, Hong Kong and Macau have “already been unified,” while Taiwan is “yet to be unified” with China, making the problem altogether different, Chang said.
Lau Siu-kai (劉兆佳), a former head of Hong Kong’s Central Policy Unit advisory body to the chief executive, said that according to his knowledge, China is indeed planning to merge the two agencies.
Asked whether “abolishing” the TAO could be part of a plan to belittle Taiwan, Lau said Beijing has always seen issues related to Taiwan and Hong Kong in the same light — as local affairs.
Furthermore, to Beijing, the TAO and HKMAO are only small agencies, Lau said.
The real reason behind the mergers and integration of government agencies is likely that the Chinese Communist Party wants to strengthen the party’s leadership and improve its governing ability, Lau 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
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
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