A National Security Bureau report on May 2 confirmed that some media organizations in Taiwan are on the same path as, or “fellow travelers” of, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and are sources of false information.
Nations such as the US, Canada and Australia have long been aware that Beijing infiltrates domestic media in a blatant example of “intervention and manipulation by foreign forces” — acts that should trigger national security alarms.
As a line of defense, these nations have implemented regulations such as the laws passed in Australia last year that target foreign interference and the Foreign Agents Registration Act in the US.
More than once, these nations have alerted the international community that Taiwan lies at the center of the “red” shadow cast by the “China factor.”
The infiltrations and destruction of the China factor can be traced through all the major events and controversies in Taiwan over the past decade, from Want Want Group’s acquisition of the China Times Group in 2008 to the movement targeting media monopolization in 2012, the Sunflower movement in 2014 and the nine-in-one local elections last year.
The events reveal how some Taiwanese media organizations — whether influenced by Chinese funding, Chinese market considerations or instructions from Beijing — come to adopt the “Chinese perspective” as they smear Taiwan and praise China, disparage democracy and compliment autocracy.
Chanting along with China and its state-run media, these media organizations pass on CCP propaganda disguised as “news” to Taiwanese.
When the CCP finally aligns Taiwanese discourse with Beijing’s thinking, the road to annexation will only be a stone’s throw away.
When the fellow travelers in Taiwanese media drop their disguises and openly praise Chinese military aircraft for “looking awesome,” talk about “disregarding Beijing’s opposition” and post maps showing Taiwan as part of China, it is time to realize the urgency of Taiwan’s situation.
When the management of some media groups gather with Chinese media at the Cross-Strait Media People Summit in Beijing and nod in agreement with the pep talk given by top Beijing officials, it is clear that the China factor has been neglected long enough and that any tolerance of fellow travelers must end here and now.
Local media should have the courage to pursue truth and freedom. Instead, some have sunk so low as to become the propaganda tools of another nation, as they clap their hands and smile approvingly at China’s People’s Political Consultative Conference National Committee Chairman Wang Yang (汪洋) and Taiwan Affairs Office Minister Liu Jieyi (劉結一) when they intimidate and ridicule Taiwan.
In what way are these media organizations any different from the retired senior military officers and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) members who sit at the feet of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People when they should be defending Taiwan’s territorial rights and national security?
What they all have in common is trying to sell Taiwan down the river for personal gain. Most Taiwanese consider them shameless.
As some people love official Chinese lectures and instructions, here are words from Wang’s speech at the recent summit: “You will be remembered by history.”
Indeed, Taiwanese will never forget you.
Jethro Wang holds a master’s degree from National Taiwan University’s Graduate Institute of National Development and is a research assistant at a think tank.
Translated by Chang Ho-ming
US President Donald Trump last week told reporters that he had signed about 12 letters to US trading partners, which were set to be sent out yesterday, levying unilateral tariff rates of up to 70 percent from Aug. 1. However, Trump did not say which countries the letters would be sent to, nor did he discuss the specific tariff rates, reports said. The news of the tariff letters came as Washington and Hanoi reached a trade deal earlier last week to cut tariffs on Vietnamese exports to the US to 20 percent from 46 percent, making it the first Asian country
Life as we know it will probably not come to an end in Japan this weekend, but what if it does? That is the question consuming a disaster-prone country ahead of a widely spread prediction of disaster that one comic book suggests would occur tomorrow. The Future I Saw, a manga by Ryo Tatsuki about her purported ability to see the future in dreams, was first published in 1999. It would have faded into obscurity, but for the mention of a tsunami and the cover that read “Major disaster in March 2011.” Years later, when the most powerful earthquake ever
As things heated up in the Middle East in early June, some in the Pentagon resisted American involvement in the Israel-Iran war because it would divert American attention and resources from the real challenge: China. This was exactly wrong. Rather, bombing Iran was the best thing that could have happened for America’s Asia policy. When it came to dealing with the Iranian nuclear program, “all options are on the table” had become an American mantra over the past two decades. But the more often US administration officials insisted that military force was in the cards, the less anyone believed it. After
During an impromptu Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) rally on Tuesday last week to protest what the party called the unfairness of the judicial system, a young TPP supporter said that if Taiwan goes to war, he would “surrender to the [Chinese] People’s Liberation Army [PLA] with unyielding determination.” The rally was held after former Taipei deputy mayor Pong Cheng-sheng’s (彭振聲) wife took her life prior to Pong’s appearance in court to testify in the Core Pacific corruption case involving former Taipei mayor and TPP chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲). The TPP supporter said President William Lai (賴清德) was leading them to die on
RSS