Tue, May 28, 2019 page3

• China exchange trips just propaganda, students say

  • By Wu Po-hsuan and William Hetherington / Staff reporter, with staff writer
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  Taiwanese students attending free or cheap academic exchanges in China are being subjected to pro-unification propaganda, several former participants said.

  Chen Ku-hsiung (陳估熊), president of the National Cheng Kung University student association, said an exchange he took part in last year had “no academic substance,” and participants were subjected to propaganda and threats aimed at Taiwanese independence supporters.

  It had cost about NT$10,000 and included visits to Macau, Beijing and Inner Mongolia, he said.

  In Macau, attendees were taken to an exhibit on the “merits of the ‘one country, two systems’ framework,” while in Beijing they were taken to China’s Taiwan Affairs Office and the Chinese government’s unification division, Chen said.

  At a banquet purportedly held for the students to interact with Chinese officials, they were told that the Chinese government would “strike at and eliminate Taiwan separatists,” he said.

  However, the “united front” efforts were mostly ineffective, as most of the students already had a “Taiwanese identity,” Chen said.

  The threats and propaganda had only served to further push Taiwanese away from China and reject Beijing’s political system, he added.

  However, some people might be influenced by the propaganda, he said, noting that one student started hosting cross-strait activities after going on such a trip.

  Even members of student groups who do not go on such trips face potential risks, as the groups have given Beijing information on all of their members, which then becomes a matter of Chinese record, he said.

  Xu Rui-fu (許瑞福), president of the National Taiwan University Graduate Student Association and who last year took part in a free seven-day trip to Beijing, Shaanxi Province and Shenzhen said that China’s main purpose was to familiarize Taiwanese with Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) political philosophy and plans.

  Students on his exchange trip were required to attend a lecture by Chinese political strategy professor Zhao Lei (趙磊) on China’s Belt and Road Initiative, and Xi’s thoughts on governance, he said.

  After the lecture, the Taiwanese students were required to collaborate with students from Renmin University of China and Peking University on reports about what they learned, Xu said.

  The majority of Taiwanese participants had wanted to better understand Chinese thoughts on politics and the economy, but the Chinese students became suspicious of those who were neutral in their reports and branded them “separatists,” Xu said.

  The students were also taken to see Liangjiahe Village (梁家河村) in Shaanxi, Xi’s hometown, he said.

  “Clearly China was trying to reach out to Taiwanese with talk of a ‘motherland’ and a shared ethnicity, but its approach was too clumsy,” he said.

  “Any Taiwanese with a functioning brain would see through it,” he said.
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