On Friday last week at an event to mark the 70th anniversary of the “Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence,” Chinese Communist Party (CCP) General-Secretary Xi Jinping (習近平) gave a speech highlighting the importance of the five principles for China’s relations with other countries.
The five principles are: mutual respect for each other’s territorial integrity and sovereignty; mutual non-aggression; mutual non-interference in each other’s internal affairs; equality and cooperation for mutual benefit; and peaceful coexistence.
These sound like lofty principles and they are. They were enunciated by then-CCP chairman Mao Zedong (毛澤東) and then-Chinese premier Zhou Enlai (周恩來) before a conference in 1955 in Bandung, Indonesia, at which the People’s Republic of China (PRC) courted the many newly independent countries that were organizing themselves in the Non-Aligned Movement headed by then-Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru and then-Indonesian president Sukarno.
Like Mao and Zhou in the 1950s, Xi is eager to use the five principles to gain support from the Global South in his struggle for influence in the world, getting countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America to side with China in his push back against the liberal rules-based international order, the post-World War II system that was designed to maintain global peace.
However, there is a problem: Xi does not apply the principles, even in relations with the countries with which they were originally agreed to. In the Himalayas, China and India have had significant border disputes for decades. It does not seem that Beijing has “respect for India’s territorial integrity and sovereignty” there.
Over the past few weeks, China has encroached on the Philippines’ territorial integrity near Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙), and with Indonesia there is a long-lasting territorial dispute in the southern part of the South China Sea, with part of the waters of Indonesia’s Natuna Islands (納土納) claimed by China using its infamous “nine-dash line,” under which it claims large parts of the South China Sea in contravention of the 2016 ruling of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague.
It would be good if Xi not only talked about the five principles, but also implemented them faithfully. It would even be better if the rulers in Beijing applied the five principles to relations with Taiwan.
One can only imagine how life would change for the better if this were to happen, both for China and Taiwan.
The leaders in Beijing have traditionally talked about “peaceful unification,” but as most people in Taiwan know very well, unification would be anything but peaceful. The aggressive language used by Beijing’s leaders is a clear indication of that.
Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim recently recited the PRC’s “reunification” mantra, showing how far he has wandered from the original principle of self-determination.
The US and other friendly countries have often used the term “peaceful resolution,” which is of course good and helpful, but it mainly emphasizes the process, and does not address the desired end-state.
The administration of US President Joe Biden has included phrasing that the future of Taiwan needs to be determined peacefully, “consistent with the wishes and best interests of the people of Taiwan.”
That goes in the right direction, but still falls short of another principle in international relations, the principle of self-determination, which is enshrined in the 1945 UN Charter. It states that the purpose of the UN is “to develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, and to take other appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace.”
Full respect of this principle of the right of Taiwanese to determine their own future would indeed bring about the much-needed peaceful coexistence between Taiwan and China.
Gerrit van der Wees is a former Dutch diplomat who teaches Taiwan history and US relations with East Asia at George Mason University and previously taught at the George Washington University Elliott School for International Affairs in Washington.
A gap appears to be emerging between Washington’s foreign policy elites and the broader American public on how the United States should respond to China’s rise. From my vantage working at a think tank in Washington, DC, and through regular travel around the United States, I increasingly experience two distinct discussions. This divergence — between America’s elite hawkishness and public caution — may become one of the least appreciated and most consequential external factors influencing Taiwan’s security environment in the years ahead. Within the American policy community, the dominant view of China has grown unmistakably tough. Many members of Congress, as
The Hong Kong government on Monday gazetted sweeping amendments to the implementation rules of Article 43 of its National Security Law. There was no legislative debate, no public consultation and no transition period. By the time the ink dried on the gazette, the new powers were already in force. This move effectively bypassed Hong Kong’s Legislative Council. The rules were enacted by the Hong Kong chief executive, in conjunction with the Committee for Safeguarding National Security — a body shielded from judicial review and accountable only to Beijing. What is presented as “procedural refinement” is, in substance, a shift away from
The shifting geopolitical tectonic plates of this year have placed Beijing in a profound strategic dilemma. As Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) prepares for a high-stakes summit with US President Donald Trump, the traditional power dynamics of the China-Japan-US triangle have been destabilized by the diplomatic success of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in Washington. For the Chinese leadership, the anxiety is two-fold: There is a visceral fear of being encircled by a hardened security alliance, and a secondary risk of being left in a vulnerable position by a transactional deal between Washington and Tokyo that might inadvertently empower Japan
After declaring Iran’s military “gone,” US President Donald Trump appealed to the UK, France, Japan and South Korea — as well as China, Iran’s strategic partner — to send minesweepers and naval forces to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. When allies balked, the request turned into a warning: NATO would face “a very bad” future if it refused. The prevailing wisdom is that Trump faces a credibility problem: having spent years insulting allies, he finds they would not rally when he needs them. That is true, but superficial, as though a structural collapse could be caused by wounded feelings. Something
RSS