The Taiwan media reported on Sunday that the Hong Kong airlines which flew a Buddhist relic to Taiwan on Saturday tried to undermine the government's ban on direct cross-strait transportation links. It was allegedly done by demanding, while the plane was flying over China, that the flight be diverted directly to Taipei.
The request was made to Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄), the head of Taiwan's Buddha Light International Association (佛光會) who was on the plane. Instead of making the requisite stopover in Hong Kong, Wu was told, the plane should fly directly from Xian to Taipei because a stopover would be "inconvenient" with a relic of the Buddha on board. Wu, however, said the flight must abide by Taiwan's regulations.
While there is no clear evidence indicating the request was made under orders from Beijing, the move shows the not-so-holy intentions hidden behind what is supposed to be a religious event.
The idea that Wu, who held important government positions in the KMT era, had any right to decide the matter was very much in line with Beijing's policy of getting cozy with Taiwan's opposition parties over the head of
the DPP government.
The Taiwan government is in a difficult position regarding cross-strait transportation links. To safeguard its embattled sovereignty, the government clings to restrictions that are no longer logical.
The crux of the problem boils down to this: Taiwan will not allow direct links with China before it can enter into negotiations with Beijing as an equal. Beijing won't enter into any negotiations with Taiwan before the latter gives up all claims to being an equal.
All ships and planes travelling across the Taiwan Strait have to stop over at a third-country location because Taiwan does not allow direct transportation. Hong Kong usually serves as the most convenient -- or rather, least inconvenient -- stopover.
That requirement has become questionable since the former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997, but Taiwan clings on to it for dear life. For one thing, Taiwan could stir up a major backlash if it were to say that Hong Kong no longer qualified as a third-country stopover and therefore everyone travelling across the Strait must make a detour to, say, the Philippines.
But at the same time, Taiwan must maintain some roadblocks to direct links just to deter Bei-jing's "domestic link" offensive, which is apparent in China's insistence that airline companies, not government officials, represent the two sides in negotiations for Hong Kong-Taiwan air links.
The reason for Taiwan's concerns was made all the more apparent by Saturday's incident. Imagine what would have happened if Wu, who is now vice chairman of the KMT -- or whichever KMT big shot who happened to be on the plane -- had said yes to the request -- a scenario we cannot rule out given what obtuse decision-making many KMT aristocrats have proven to be capable of.
Taiwan's authorities would likely not allow the plane to land at CKS airport. The plane would circle over the airport repeating its landing request until the fuel ran low. It would have been a major embarrassment for the government in any case. It could have started another dispute between the government and the opposition parties. What's worse, it could make the government look very bad in the eyes of at least a portion of Taiwan's Buddhist community even though the government would be legally justified in asking the plane to go to Hong Kong.
In fact, that was exactly the focus of the hype by pro-China media in Taiwan on Sunday. A great effort was made to highlight how ridiculous the government had been in banning direct links, while downplaying Beijing's underhanded attempts to undermine Taiwan's sovereignty.
For a Buddhist, motivation is what ultimately decides the moral nature of an action: even an ostensibly virtuous action becomes bad karma if it is done with ill will. The good Buddhists who tried to divert the plane to Taipei seemed to have forgotten one of the 10 non-virtuous acts that Shakyamuni Buddha advised us to avoid: divisive speech. Or, for that matter, any action aimed at sowing discord. The fact that it was attempted under cover of a sacred object makes the act even more unholy.
Aye Nge is a freelance writer based in Taipei.
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