US-based Taiwan watchers are playing down President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) weekend remarks, saying they do not go further than former president Lee Teng-hui's (李登輝) 1999 "state-to-state" declaration, and were probably aimed at domestic audiences rather than serving notice to an international audience of Chen's intention to move toward independence.
"It's just a slight repackaging" of Lee's comments, said June Teufel Dreyer, a professor at the University of Miami and a member of the US-China Security Review Commission.
"It's too fuzzy and too vague to be seen as a major shift," notes Robert Sutter, Asian Studies professor at Georgetown University in Washington.
"I hope it doesn't build up to anything. I don't think it will, unless the Chinese side uses it for internal succession purposes," says Nat Bellocchi, a former head of the American Institute in Taiwan.
These and other comments reflect the reaction by the George W. Bush administration, which has tried to downplay Chen's remarks that there is "one country on either side of the Taiwan Strait" and that he wants to push for legislation to allow a referendum on the issue.
"Chen was trying to play to the crowd," said Coen Blaauw, the executive director of the Formosan Association for Public Affairs, a leading pro-independence Taiwan lobbying group in Washington. "It was a mixed message," and "not a major shift," he said.
He and others in Washington stressed the context of Chen's remarks. They note he made them before an organization, the World Federation of Taiwanese Associations, that favors independence and that is a big financial supporter of the DPP.
Chen did not specifically link his call for a referendum with his comments on Taiwan's sovereignty, Blaauw said. Instead, Blaauw said, Chen was protesting against the fact that under the KMT, no referenda were permitted, despite the fact that martial law was lifted in 1989.
"There is nothing new under the sun [in Chen's remarks]," Blaauw said.
Bellocchi said that Chen's remarks are good for Taiwan. "I think that Taiwan has to raise its profile. If the international community does not hear from Taiwan from time to time, it's not good for Taiwan. We might not like it here sometimes, but it is quite understandable," Bellocchi said.
Besides, Bellocchi said, Chen couldn't get a referendum law passed if he tried. "Taiwan does not have the votes for a referendum," he said. "It's not likely that thing is going to go any further. I don't think it's possible now."
Chen's remarks may have been made out of frustration with China's failure to respond to his calls for resumed cross-Strait dialogue, Dreyer said. Since Chen has tried to restart the talks, "Beijing has responded with lordly disdain," she said.
She also said Chen did not specify the purpose of the referendum. "The referendum could be on a `one China, two systems' question. Could the PRC object to that?," she said.
Sutter saw Chen's latest remarks as the continuation of a pattern of increasingly strident statements that began in May with the second anniversary of Chen's May 2000 election.
"It is certainly a movement and a posturing that is different than the past. It's not as reserved as it was in the past, and I would assume that, if he doesn't get a strong reaction to it from the United States or from domestic forces in Taiwan or from Beijing, that he may do more of it," Sutter said.
The statement "doesn't serve American interests as far as I can see. It causes uncertainty and instability."
Nevertheless, Sutter feels that Washington, if needed, has the ability to calm any fallout. "I don't think this is a big deal. I think it's easily handled," he said.
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