Denounce the quislings
The annual Straits Forum in Xiamen, China, long ago earned itself the moniker “United Front Forum.” This year, a China Central Television program claimed that former legislative speaker Wang Jin-pyng’s (王金平) planned Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) delegation to the forum was to “sue for peace.”
Having been trampled over by Beijing, the KMT announced that it would boycott the forum. However, the People First Party (PFP) and New Party still planned to attend. What is wrong with these people?
PFP adviser Li Jian-nan (黎建南) even engaged in shameless braggadocio, lauding Chinese fighter jets’ regular encirclements of Taiwan for frightening off the “American dogs.”
PFP Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) abandoned the KMT to create his own party. In the early days, it performed well in legislative and local elections, while its core value of being a party that was “close to the people” resonated with voters.
However, by attending the “United Front Forum” and acting as the enemy’s mouthpiece, the PFP has turned itself into the “close to China” party.
China is run by a totalitarian regime that aggressively threatens Taiwan’s population with its military, suppresses Tibetans, erects concentration camps in Xinjiang, turns young protesters in Hong Kong into floating corpses and forces a program of Sinicization upon the people of Inner Mongolia.
How can such a country seem attractive to anyone on this side of the Taiwan Strait? Their fawning at the feet of China’s leaders is sickening.
One of these raving lunatics even defended Beijing’s provocative military exercises during recent visits to Taiwan by foreign dignitaries, saying: “China was upholding its dignity and preventing others from interfering in its internal affairs.”
One wonders if it has even crossed these clowns’ minds that if Taiwan one day did become “unified” with China, they would have no more forums to attend and no stage on which to strut their stuff — they would be unceremoniously tossed into the dustbin of history by Beijing.
Taiwanese must join together to renounce these treacherous quislings.
Pan Kuan
New Taipei City
The US and TikTok
Following US President Donald Trump’s executive orders signed last month against TikTok’s owner, the US Department of Commerce last week announced the severest prohibitions possible, in which US downloads of TikTok and fund transferring services through WeChat are banned.
The department claimed this was to safeguard national security, given that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) used these apps to collect Americans’ personal and proprietary information.
TikTok was also alleged to sensor content that the CCP deems to be politically sensitive, such as the Hong Kong protests and China’s treatment of Uighurs and Muslim minorities, serving the CCP’s interests.
Despite the fact that the US government has never provided any evidence of what it has alleged, it is inclined to eliminate TikTok and this aroused tremendous controversy around the world, especially in China, when TikTok was considered to be “kneeling down” so fast after Trump’s administrative order.
The US prohibitions should be treated as a part of the Sino-US trade dispute. Unlike soybeans and corn, mobile applications such as TikTok and WeChat are virtual digital products that have gained a great deal of popularity in the US, while their US counterparts such as Facebook and Twitter have failed to enter China’s market due to political censorship and protectionism.
Firmly believing former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping’s (鄧小平) adage “if you open the window, both fresh air and flies will be blown in,” the Chinese government has endeavored to build up a filter against anti-regime content and ensure its “Internet sovereignty.”
However, in the eyes of US politicians, this is a kind of trade deficit that needs to be resolved. Such a firewall is seen as essentially a government-led trade barrier to protect domestic firms from direct competition.
Trump believes that a country with a bilateral trade deficit is being taken advantage of by its partner.
He thinks it is high time that the US stood up to China’s chronic trading abuses beyond tangible goods, whether they be intangible and virtual.
Jacky Tam
Hong Kong
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