China’s decision to end tariff reductions on some Taiwanese imports under the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) is an attempt to interfere with Saturday’s elections, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Vice President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday.
The Chinese Customs Tariff Commission last month announced it was suspending preferential tariffs on 12 petrochemical products starting on Monday last week, citing trade barriers imposed by Taiwan on similar products.
Reports yesterday said that Beijing was considering expanding those suspensions to machinery, textiles, automotive parts, and fishery and farm produce.
Photo: CNA
“Taiwan and China are WTO members, and must follow WTO mechanisms to resolve trade disputes,” Lai told reporters during a campaign event in central Taiwan.
That China announced the change so close to the elections shows that it is using trade to pressure Taiwanese businesspeople, he said.
“Fortunately Taiwan has forged many international links to do business with markets around the world, so we must stay the course,” he said.
Lai’s presidential campaign spokesman, Vincent Chao (趙怡翔), said that the government cannot accept such unilateral moves to impose economic sanctions without going through the WTO.
“Beijing is saying it is taking the lead in this arrangement, and that they are the ones who can grant permission for future negotiations with Taiwan or for Taiwan to advance commercial links with foreign markets,” Chao said. “This would not be accepted by any sovereign country.”
He said that Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) vice presidential candidate Jaw Shaw-kong (趙少康) proposed a “diplomatic truce” with Beijing during a televised debate.
The KMT is to reset government policy back to an era of diplomacy under the “one China” policy, when their party was in power under former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), he said.
In that scenario, Taiwan must rely on China’s goodwill to pursue foreign affairs and forget formal ties with countries, he added.
“Most of the world is paying attention to Taiwan’s presidential and legislative elections, so we cannot let blue and white political forces lead to Taiwan into diplomatic disasters, and regress back to a ‘one China’ policy, as under these positions, Taiwan would pay severe economic costs and suffer the consequences,” he said.
Chao pointed to a Bloomberg article published on Friday last week in which Dylan Patel, founder of research group SemiAnalysis said that in a best-case scenario, a DPP administration would sustain Taiwan’s status as an “independent location to fabricate chips and assemble AI [artificial intelligence] servers,” but a KMT win might lead firms diversify away from Taiwan.
“The KMT wants to shackle Taiwan in the ‘one China’ principle preventing it from conducting international diplomacy, while the Taiwan People’s Party has no vision, and no plan for foreign affairs, while its chairman and presidential candidate, Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), has frequently contradicted himself when speaking on national security and international issues,” DPP spokeswoman Tai Wei-shan (戴瑋姍) said.
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