China has falsely linked UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 with its “one China principle” and used the resolution to legitimize its acts to limit Taiwan’s participation in world bodies and possibly invade Taiwan by force, President William Lai (賴清德) said at the annual meeting of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC) in Taipei yesterday.
UN Resolution 2758 was passed by the UN General Assembly on Oct. 25, 1971, stating that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is the legitimate government of China, which led to the PRC replacing the Republic of China (ROC), Taiwan’s official name, in the UN.
Beijing’s “one China principle” asserts that there is only one China, which is the PRC and not the ROC, and that it has jurisdiction over Taiwan.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Lai also thanked the US government and the European Parliament for repudiating China’s attempts to link the resolution and its “one China principle.”
Meanwhile, Taiwan was formally welcomed yesterday as an official IPAC member at the group’s annual meeting.
“Taiwan will do its best to put out a democratic protection umbrella with our democratic partners to keep them away from the threat of authoritarianism,” Lai said.
Photo courtesy of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China
The president said Taiwan hopes to realize this goal by adhering to the “four pillars.”
Lai in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal in July last year defined the pillars as building up the nation’s defense capabilities, promoting economic security and fostering supply chain resilience, forming partnerships with other democracies, and maintaining steady and principled cross-strait leadership.
Taiwan is resolute in its determination to maintain regional peace and stability, and deeply believes that peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait are linked with the development of global democracy, he said.
Lai cited recent Chinese aggression in the East and South China seas, and its joint military exercises with Russia as evidence of threats posed by autocratic expansion, while also citing this year’s NATO summit declaration that “China has become a decisive enabler of Russia’s war against Ukraine.”
During the meeting, all IPAC members agreed that China has distorted UN Resolution 2758 in their home nations and also agreed to enact efforts to support Taiwan’s participation in UN bodies.
The IPAC session stated that the 1971 resolution only confirmed that the PRC was China’s legal representative to the UN. It did not mention Taiwan or its political status, support China’s claims toward Taiwan or explicitly comment on Taiwan’s capability to join the UN and related bodies.
It is regrettable that China has distorted the meaning of Resolution 2758 to imply that it supports China’s “one China principle,” and equally regrettable to see China altering historical documents, changing references to “Taiwan” to “Taiwan, China.”
Separately, at a Ministry of Foreign Affairs banquet on Monday, IPAC chair Olivier Cadic said China’s recent guidelines targeting Taiwan might be in violation of UN human rights principles.
Cadic also called on China to stop its irresponsible and aggressive military actions, and to respect the rights of free passage to all ships sailing through the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea.
Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Chung-kwang (田中光) thanked IPAC for raising international awareness about Chinese efforts to undermine the international order, as well as those of members of the G7 and the G20.
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
Taiwan yesterday denied Chinese allegations that its military was behind a cyberattack on a technology company in Guangzhou, after city authorities issued warrants for 20 suspects. The Guangzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau earlier yesterday issued warrants for 20 people it identified as members of the Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command (ICEFCOM). The bureau alleged they were behind a May 20 cyberattack targeting the backend system of a self-service facility at the company. “ICEFCOM, under Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, directed the illegal attack,” the warrant says. The bureau placed a bounty of 10,000 yuan (US$1,392) on each of the 20 people named in
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification