Palauan President Surangel Whipps Jr in a letter to an unnamed US senator on Feb. 9 said that China has offered to “fill every hotel room,” in Palau, “and more if more are built” if the small island nation were to break ties with Taiwan. The letter further claims that China offered US$20 million per year for the creation of a “call center” in Palau, a nation whose economy relies heavily on tourism.
It is more evidence that for China, tourism is an economic tool for its political gain.
Cleo Paskal, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, posted Whipps’ letter on social media and said that Beijing’s offer was an attempt to sever Palau’s relationship with the US and Taiwan.
It is nothing new that Beijing uses dollar diplomacy, and that China has long used its tourists as a weapon to pressure or reward other nations for political purposes, such as in 2017, when Beijing banned Chinese from traveling to Seoul after the US said it would deploy the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense missile defense system in South Korea.
Cross-strait tourism especially has been politically manipulated by China and its tourism agencies. China unilaterally cut the numbers of tourists and students traveling to Taiwan when President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) took power in 2016, and completely banned Chinese tourists from visiting Taiwan in 2019.
After the COVID-19 pandemic, Taiwan resumed reciprocal tourism relationships with the rest of the world and reopened to Chinese visitors, as well as allowing Taiwanese individual travelers to visit China.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications in August last year announced a plan to restart group tours to China next month, hoping China would open the door for Chinese wishing to visit Taiwan and resuming cross-strait tourism. However, China kept mum on allowing Chinese tourists to visit Taiwan, failing to reciprocate Taiwan’s goodwill.
Beijing then unilaterally altered flight routes near Taiwan, along with sending an increasing number of jets and ships over the median line of the Taiwan Strait, intentionally putting flight safety at risk and violating Taiwan’s sovereignty.
The Tourism Administration on Feb. 7 announced that it would be suspending its plan to restart group tours to China next month. Taiwanese who have already paid for tours to China between March 1 and May 31 would be allowed to go, but a complete ban is to take effect on June 1.
Some travel agencies, most of which rely heavily on the Chinese market, and pro-China politicians argued that the suspension is against the spirit of the free market, and even threatened to protest at the inauguration of president-elect William Lai (賴清德) in May. They refuse to acknowledge China’s manipulation of cross-strait tourism whereby Taiwanese can travel to China, but Chinese are banned from traveling to Taiwan, and which could make Taiwan suffer an estimated NT$ 80 billion(US$ 2.54 billion) deficit in tourism industry. For China, cross-strait tourism is a tool to hold Taiwanese firms relying on the manipulated market hostage.
Following last month’s elections, in which voters granted the Democratic Progressive Party a historic third term, despite China’s interference, Whipps’ letter has shown more evidence of Beijing using Chinese tourists to harm Taiwan’s international alliances.
“Continuing with this reopening policy without getting a friendly response is not something we can tolerate,” Minister of Transportation and Communications Wang Kwo-tsai (王國材) said.
Cross-strait tourism should be based on equal and reciprocal two-way travel, not sacrificing Taiwan’s national interests and dignity. Taiwan should be cautious about reopening group tours to China, and more importantly, should encourage the tourism industry to explore more domestic and international tours so as not to rely so heavily on the Chinese market.
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