The Russian city of Vladivostok lies approximately 45km from the Sino-Russian border on the Sea of Japan. The area was not always Russian territory: It was once the site of a Chinese settlement.
The settlement would later be known as Yongmingcheng (永明城), the “city of eternal light,” during the Yuan Dynasty. That light was extinguished in 1858 when a large area of land was ceded by the Qing Dynasty to the Russian Empire with the signing of the Treaty of Aigun.
The People’s Republic of China founded by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has never ruled Taiwan. Taiwan was governed by the Qing Dynasty from 1683 to 1895, before it was ceded to Imperial Japan in the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895.
Both treaties were signed by a weakened Qing Dynasty during China’s “century of humiliation,” a period that provides the driving force behind Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) “dream of the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,” and his obsession with unifying China and Taiwan.
There is no “dream.” Xi’s ambition to annex Taiwan has more to do with realpolitik and geopolitical advantage.
Shimonoseki is well known; Aigun less so. After President William Lai (賴清德) mentioned it during an interview on The View with Catherine Chang (雅琴看世界), asking why the CCP claims Taiwan as its territory, but is willing to leave a large part of what used to be Manchuria in northeast China to Russia, articles began appearing in the Chinese-language media explaining what the Treaty of Aigun was, with some lambasting Lai for what they called a false comparison.
Lai mentioned Aigun to illustrate his point that the CCP’s ambition to annex Taiwan was less about territorial claims than it was about changing the international world order. He did not come up with the comparison on the spur of the moment. It was intentional, to call for more scrutiny on the details and the logic of the CCP’s claims to Taiwan.
This is an indication of how Lai intends to address the CCP’s agenda-driven distortions of history, by more aggressively challenging its narrative and the lies that support it.
Former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) sought a reasonable solution to cross-strait relations with his concept of state-to-state relations, but was soundly rebuffed by the CCP. His successor, Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), was more explicitly pro-independence and branded a “troublemaker” by the administration of then-US president George W. Bush. Former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) sought a “diplomatic truce” with the CCP, while former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) opted for the improvement of Taiwan’s relations with like-minded countries, and closer affiliation with the US to increase Taiwan’s profile and highlight its value to the international community.
It appears Lai is now saying “you have seen Taiwan’s value, now look more closely and critically at the CCP’s narrative.” That the only figures branding Lai a troublemaker are the CCP and the pan-blue camp is a measure of how things have progressed.
The first distortion to be identified for scrutiny is the CCP’s assertion that UN Resolution 2758 does anything to “settle the issue” of the CCP’s jurisdiction over Taiwan.
US officials have made it clear on several occasions that the resolution does no such thing, and on Aug. 21 the Australian Senate unanimously passed a motion rejecting the misinterpretation of Resolution 2758. It is now Taiwan’s turn.
On Tuesday, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Chung-kwang (田中光) said that Taiwan would appeal to the international community to stop China from misrepresenting Resolution 2758 when the UN General Assembly meets later this month. Hopefully, Lai will continue to push for scrutiny to unravel the CCP’s lies.
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