China remains the biggest impediment to Taiwan’s bid to join international organizations and this issue should be discussed in upcoming cross-strait talks, legislators across party lines said yesterday.
Both Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers criticized Beijing for continuing to obstruct Taiwan’s efforts to gain more international space despite the recent cross-strait diplomatic detente.
Speaking at the legislature’s Foreign and National Defense Committee, Minister of Foreign Affairs Timothy Yang (楊進添) said China was still the biggest impediment to Taiwan’s participation in international organizations, such as its bid to become an observer at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
PHOTO: LIAO YAO-TUNG, TAIPEI TIMES
“The International Technology Research Institute [ITRI] has been representing Taiwan at the UNFCCC as a non-governmental organization since 1995. But despite our repeated protests throughout the years, the convention insists on putting our NGO under China,” he said.
If Beijing were truly sincere in extending its goodwill, it should reciprocate the “diplomatic truce” by loosening its grip on Taiwan’s bid to join international bodies such as the UNFCCC, KMT Legislator Liu Sheng-liang (劉盛良) said.
“It is utterly useless for Taiwan to write protest letters or stage demonstrations on the sidelines of the meetings because the member-states still won’t support our cause unless China agrees to step aside,” he said, suggesting that China and Taiwan should launch immediate talks on the issue.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Tsai Huang-liang (蔡煌瑯) said Taiwan’s participation in the convention as an observer would be a “true indication” that China was serious about reducing cross-strait tension and that the so-called “truce” declared unilaterally by President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was effective.
Tsai agreed that the issue should be an item on the agenda of next week’s talks in Taichung.
Yang promised that he would talk with the Mainland Affairs Council to determine when it would be appropriate to bring up the issue with Beijing.
KMT Legislator Shuai Hua-min (帥化民), meanwhile, slammed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Environmental Protection Agency for “chasing trends” instead of developing workable solutions to the country’s deteriorating ecosystem.
“Taiwan is running out of water and the government is still concerned about joining an international organization just to prove we are part of the global community. Why not use the resources and the money to solve our domestic issues instead of trying to enter a group that we have very little chance of getting into?” he said.
If China is so interested in claiming Taiwan as it own, he said, then why not just blame China for Taiwan’s carbon emissions?
Tsai also criticized the foreign ministry for putting multiple pictures of the president in a brochure on Taiwan’s need to join the UNFCCC.
The two-sided glossy brochure has eight pictures of the aftermath of Typhoon Morakot that killed more than 700 people in August and four of them show Ma hugging sobbing women, speaking to the victims or surveying flooded villages.
An online version of the brochure is also available on the foreign ministry’s Web site.
“What does Ma have to do with Taiwan’s hope to join the UNFCCC? The brochure looks more like Ma’s campaign material than a document to promote Taiwan,” Tsai said.
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