Print

Mail

wiki links

Europe moves to embrace Taiwan

On Sept. 5, the European Parlia-ment adopted a resolution called "A strategic framework for enhanced partnerships." It is the most substantive and unambiguous of all Taiwan-friendly resolutions passed in recent years. Not only does it acknowledge Tai-wan's democratization process, but it also supports the fact that there is a lot of room for Taiwan to maneuver in the international arena.

The European Parliament is the highest institution in the EU representing public opinion. The 1957 Treaty of Rome bestowed only a very limited consultative role on the the parliament and it was not until the 1992 Treaty on European Union and the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam that it was confirmed that the parliament had powers similar to those of a national parliament. These powers were even extended to include legislative, budgetary and supervisory powers.

However, if we take a closer look, there is still a difference between the legislative powers of the European Parliament and those of a regular national parliament. This is mainly because resolutions passed by the European Parliament must be accepted by the Council of the EU and thus become what the EU calls a "codecision" between the two institutions. The resolutions are then passed to the European Commission which will consider turning them into policy.

The European Parliament's passing of the Taiwan-friendly resolution is therefore only a first step on the way to expanding substantive diplomatic relations between Taiwan and the EU. In particular, procedures at the Council of the European Union often involve complex political relationships within individual countries which are quite difficult to break through.

The eight parts in the European Parliament's resolution dealing with Taiwan are very concrete. There is a call for the "Asia Europe Meeting" (ASEM) to associate Taiwan in that group. There is a call for Taiwan and China to initiate dialogue to establish conflict prevention mechanisms. Both sides are urged to de-escalate their arms build-up and China is urged to withdraw its missiles in the coastal provinces across the Taiwan Strait. The European Commission is urged to initiate negotiations which would lead to an EU-Taiwan free trade agreement. Taiwan's bid to participate in the WHO as observer is also supported. The resolution recognizes the importance of the democratic process in Taiwan and the results of the December 2001 legislative elections.

The resolution emphasizes that a peaceful resolution to the Tai-wan question is crucial if political and economic stability in the region are to be maintained. It also urges the Council and member states of the EU to honor their commitment to the fundamental rights of freedom to travel and therefore to issue visas to the president and all high-ranking officials of Taiwan for private visits to the EU.

These are eight big points which meet almost all expectations and goals that the government for many years has tried to achieve in its diplomatic efforts. A legislative delegation from Taiwan was visiting Europe just as this resolution was passed. Many people may have thought that this was the final and decisive push for the resolution through "legislative diplomacy," but this is not completely true. The greatest push has probably come from non-official ROC representative offices in Europe and their quiet behind-the-scenes work to initiate a normalization of the Taiwan-EU relationship.

The fact that all these years of efforts come to fruition only today once again proves that, if Taiwan is to gain more maneuvering space, the diplomatic team should be based on an inter-party, inter-ministerial cooperative partnership of talented people. If the government had rejected talent, the EU resolution would still lie in a distant future.

Taking a comprehensive view of the EU resolution, the government should prepare and plan future reciprocal measures. The US, Japan and the EU are strong internationally and they are also three parties with which Taiwan interacts diplomatically. Beginning with the European Parliament, the government should, at the very least, have a firm grasp of the following issues:

One, quickly set up industrial, governmental and academic work committees aimed at the EU (and the European Parliament). There is still room for improvement of the economic and trade relationship between Taiwanese industry and the EU, and there is also an abundance of academic human resources. Government agencies should therefore take on an intermediary role.

Two, although the European Parliament doesn't have enforcement powers over the European Commission or the Council of the EU, it has the power to influence ideas. Taiwan's government could further analyze how to arrange it so that the European Parliament's resolution becomes a reference for policy implementation by the EU's individual members.

Three, call for EU's member countries to support the association of Taiwan in ASEM, and plan the negotiation of a free trade agreement and related matters with the EU, all based on a platform of human rights and reason.

Four, initiate a three-way forum for peace dialogue between EU, China and Taiwan to speed up the building of a crisis prevention mechanism in the Asian region.

The EU's Taiwan-friendly actions will undoubtedly agitate Beijing, which will try to restrict Taiwan's movements. An evaluation based on the cross-strait situation shows that it would be very difficult to now send Taiwan's president to Europe.

Even though members of the European Parliament support private visits by Taiwan's leaders, it is still open to doubt whether there is a consensus among the individual countries.

The focus of government considerations on how to increase Taiwan's international presence without excessively exciting certain countries to react inappropriately should still be on a step-by-step basis, gradually accumulating advances. This seems to me to be the best strategy for survival.

Gerard Chow is a professor in the Institute of China Studies at National Sun Yat-sen University and the founder of the Washington-based Institute for Cross-Strait Relations.

Translated by Perry Svensson
This story has been viewed 2492 times.