Beijing’s suppression of Taiwanese leaders’ overseas engagements is neither new nor partisan. In 1995, then-president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) was prevented from continuing a Middle East trip to Israel after pressure from Beijing. In 1997, then-vice president Lien Chan (連戰) had his European itinerary to Spain curtailed. In 2002, then-president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) was blocked from entering Indonesia. Different leaders and administrations have faced the same issue: Taiwan’s international presence has been restricted regardless of who held office in Taipei.
President William Lai’s (賴清德) canceled visit to Eswatini is the latest example of a long-term pattern. Beijing continues to project coercive power beyond its borders by pressuring third countries to restrict Taiwan’s external engagement and, through repeated obstruction, limit the ability of Taiwan’s elected leaders to travel internationally.
What matters is less the disruption itself than the model of coercion it represents. Beijing does not need to block Taiwan’s leaders directly to suffocate the nation’s international space; instead, it could make exclusion appear procedural rather than political. That blurs the line between sovereign choice and external pressure and makes intimidation easier to normalize and more corrosive to international rules.
The Legislative Yuan framed the incident as a matter of international norms rather than cross-strait politics. The legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee passed a Democratic Progressive Party-proposed motion, which Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators did not sign but did not object to, condemning Beijing for coercing third countries into revoking overflight permissions.
Such conduct contravened sovereign equality and non-interference under the UN Charter, the prohibition on coercive intervention in UN General Assembly Resolution 2625, undermined the non-discrimination principle in the Chicago Convention and ran against transit protections under Article 40 of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, the motion said. It also called on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to raise the issue through diplomatic channels and international mechanisms, including the International Civil Aviation Organization. International reactions indicate growing convergence among democratic allies, increasingly framing Taiwan as a test case for indirect authoritarian coercion.
Taiwan has no room for defeatism, yet maintaining its international presence has grown more demanding. What might look like a speech or nominal visit often reflects careful negotiation and efforts to navigate external pressure.
Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim’s (蕭美琴) appearance in Brussels for the annual summit of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China in November last year and Premier Cho Jung-tai’s (卓榮泰) trip to the Tokyo Dome for the World Baseball Classic match last month should be seen in that light. Their significance lies less in the settings than in the fact such appearances remain possible.
More broadly, this pattern carries implications beyond Taiwan. Lai’s visit highlights how coercion operates indirectly, incrementally and through systems that present themselves as neutral. If the international community becomes accustomed to third countries being pressured into restricting elected leaders’ movement, the erosion would not be confined to one case or country.
Taiwan might be the first to experience such pressure but what is being tested is the resilience of a wider rules-based order. The norms at stake are global.
Gahon Chiang is a congressional staff member in the office of Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chen Kuan-ting, focusing on Taiwan’s national security policy.
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