Taiwanese sovereignty and democratic institutions will be increasingly undermined by China’s growing influence without a coherent strategic response from the government, an Institute for National Defense and Security Research report said.
Promoting social-economic integration, sowing political division and introducing unilateral changes to the “status quo” are the main instruments of Beijing’s “united front” work against Taiwan, the think tank said in the Annual Assessment of the Security Environment in the Indo-Pacific Region, published on Dec. 13.
China’s operations have expanded from growing economic and social ties to ideological integration by means such as increasing the enrollment of Taiwanese students at Chinese universities and its 31 measures to attract Taiwanese, it said.
Beijing is increasingly looking to “sharp power” to counter the negative perception of China held by Taiwanese, it said.
China continues to rely on a divide-and-conquer strategy and seeks to alienate Taiwanese from their government by using diplomatic pressure, military drills and the 31 measures, and by offering residency permits, it said.
For example, China’s Taiwan Affairs Office claimed that the wave of diplomatic ally poaching, and sea and air drills in June, were intended for Premier William Lai (賴清德) — who has said he is pro-independence — and not for the public, it said.
While Beijing avoided conspicuous actions during Taiwan’s past few elections, it broke the pattern this year by stepping up interference operations in the run-up to the Nov. 24 local elections, the report said.
The Ministry of Justice’s Investigation Bureau discovered that China had made substantial campaign contributions to certain political candidates and spread fake news online, it said.
Beijing’s diplomatic offensive is intended to assert its “one China” principle in the international arena to create the impression that Taiwan is a part of China, forcing Taipei’s acquiescence to the so-called “1992 consensus,” it said.
The “1992 consensus,” a term that former Mainland Affairs Council chairman Su Chi (蘇起) in 2006 admitted to making up in 2000, refers to a tacit understanding between the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Chinese government that both sides of the Strait acknowledge there is “one China,” with each side having its own interpretation of what “China” means.
Inflicting “disproportionate punishment” on Taiwan by means such as forcing name changes at international organizations is part of Beijing’s efforts to shape the international perception of Taiwan, and encourage it to accept “Taiwan, China” (中國台灣) it said.
China’s “united front” tactics — including friendly gestures, exchanges and threats — have public and clandestine components, and the clandestine component is far more substantial than the public component, the report said.
The clandestine component of “united front” work consists of under-the-table exchanges with Taiwanese enterprises, private associations involved in cross-strait exchanges, members of the social and economic elite, and the media, it said.
From China’s perspective, “united front” tactics have achieved measurable success in Taiwan, while Taiwanese authorities have not effectively coordinated their response across government agencies, it said.
Should the government fail to check Beijing’s “united front” work with a strategic policy, the nation’s sovereign status and democratic institutions are certain to be affected, the institute 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