President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) government is making continuously greater efforts to link Taiwan with China. Ma plans to sign an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with China to lock Taiwan to China’s economy to reach his ultimate goal of eventual unification.
We can be sure that once Taiwan’s economy becomes part of China’s, the current level of independence and freedom enjoyed here in Taiwan will change. In addition, China, intent on swallowing Taiwan, will seek to “yield benefits” to Taiwan once an ECFA is signed to disguise its evil plan of using economic means to obtain its goal of unification.
As all of this has been going on, Ma has also been busy trying to establish the theory that the territorial sovereignty of Taiwan belongs to the Republic of China (ROC).
While on the surface this theory may seem to be aimed at establishing a basis linking the ROC to Taiwan, in reality it is a crude attempt on Ma’s behalf to legitimize China’s claims that Taiwan is part of the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
To establish this theory, the celebration for the 100th anniversary of the ROC has avoided talk of “nation building,” as this highlights the fact that Taiwan and China are two separate nations, and instead is focusing on hammering home the point that the sovereignty of Taiwan “belongs” to the ROC and is a “fact” with a legal basis.
If Ma manages to establish this theory it will follow as a matter of course that when the PRC succeeds the ROC it will also own Taiwan’s sovereignty. This shows us just how scary and potentially harmful Ma’s schemes are.
Last week, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a memorandum on Taiwan’s international position in which it stressed that the ROC government accepted the surrender of Japan in Nanjing on Sept. 9, 1945, and then on Oct. 25 that year also accepted the surrender of Japan’s governor-general of Taiwan in Taipei’s Zhongshan Hall.
The memorandum stated that these two incidents “prove” that the ROC regained territorial sovereignty over Taiwan both de jure and de facto.
It also stated that this “fact” was later reaffirmed when the Sino-Japanese Peace Treaty (中日和約), also known as the Treaty of Taipei, was signed on April 28, 1952.
On March 29, at a press conference for the celebration of the ROC’s 100th anniversary, Ma stated matter-of-factly that the ROC government was relocated here and that Taiwan’s sovereignty thus belongs to the ROC. This is, of course, an outright lie.
To be blunt, it is wishful thinking to try and use such a rough theory to make a claim to Taiwan’s sovereignty.
At the end of World War II, dictator Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) troops came to Taiwan to accept surrender of the Japanese army under direction of the Allied forces’ General Order No. 1.
This was, however, a temporary military occupation that had nothing to do with a transfer of sovereignty. At that time, the Japanese were also ordered to surrender Indochina north of the 16th parallel to Chiang. Does this mean the ROC has a claim to territory in Vietnam? Of course it doesn’t.
Furthermore, back then, the Japanese surrendered the Three Eastern Provinces (東三省) of China, being Heilongjiang (黑龍江), Jilin (吉林) and Liaoning (遼寧) to the commander-in-chief of Soviet forces in the Far East. Following Ma’s logic, does this mean these three provinces are territories of the Soviet Union? It is therefore extremely dishonest of the Ma government to try and use temporary military occupation to prove that Taiwan belongs to the ROC.
If we take a further look at the Treaty of San Francisco that came into effect on April 28, 1952, we see that it clearly stated: “Japan renounces all right, title and claim to Formosa and the Pescadores.”
However, it did not state who Taiwan was ceded to. According to international law, Taiwan’s sovereignty should have been given to the people of Taiwan. When Ma talks about the ROC government relocating to Taiwan, he is referring to the refugees who fled to Taiwan after the Chinese communists exterminated the ROC.
At that time, countries world-wide were worried about the expansion of communist power and therefore tacitly recognized Chiang’s regime and his temporary military occupation of Taiwan. However, the way Chiang’s army treated Taiwan as its own after getting here was outright theft and characteristic of a regime of bandits.
History often provides us with the best explanations. In 1950, Chiang said: “The ROC ceased to exist at the end of last year when it was subjugated and eliminated by the mainland.” When the ROC was established in 1912, Taiwan was Japanese territory and not part of the ROC. When the ROC was extinguished by the Chinese Communist Party in 1949, Taiwan was still officially Japanese territory and not part of the ROC.
From the beginning of its days up until now, the ROC has never possessed territorial sovereignty over Taiwan and it is an absolute joke to try and twist things to try to prove that the ROC owns Taiwan on the so-called 100th anniversary of the ROC.
However, Ma’s ultimate goal is not to protect and stand up for the ROC or Taiwan; but to try and establish what he thinks to be the truth: That Taiwan is a part of the PRC.
Therefore, we must all remain aware and stop Ma from trying to use the old, rotten corpse of the ROC to unite Taiwan with China.
TRANSLATED BY DREW CAMERON
Having returned to the UK late last year and with a Taiwanese spouse remaining in Taiwan, I have been afforded the chance to compare and contrast the UK and Taiwanese governments’ responses to the COVID-19 crisis. My early conclusions are that Taiwan benefits from a rational, competent government, which quickly recognizes, adapts to and confronts large-scale disasters. It is led by a government that does more than just talk of respecting democracy and human rights, one that is scrutinized and responds to criticism, one that is concerned about public opinion, and one that is used to dealing with emergencies on
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