The UK’s engagement with Taiwan and China should not be a matter of choosing one side or the other, and maintaining relations with China does not mean it cannot have a fruitful relationship with Taiwan, British Member of Parliament (MP) Sarah Champion said in an interview.
“I don’t think it’s an either-or. I don’t think that if you have relationships with China that means that you can’t have productive relationships with Taiwan,” said Champion, cochair of the British-Taiwanese All Party Parliamentary Group.
Champion also emphasized that the relationship between Taiwan and the UK should not be restricted by any preconditions proposed by China.
Photo: AP
“You [Taiwan and China] are two separate states and one should not be influencing the other,” she added.
Taiwan is a hugely valuable partner to the UK, Champion said, adding that it is really important that democracies stick together, particularly at a time when the share of countries that are democracies has declined from about 50 percent to about 33 percent over the past 20 years.
There are many opportunities for collaborative research projects between Taiwan and the UK that would strengthen both countries’ skills and economies, particularly in artificial intelligence and sustainable energy, she said.
Although Champion’s Labour Party pledged “a full audit” of its relations with China during the summer general election last year, in which it won in a landslide, the new Labour government has pared back its China audit. That shift has led some to question whether the much-touted “audit” was merely a formality.
Champion said she was not sure how many central government ministries and agencies have been included in the audit, other than the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
She said she was not sure whether the audit results would be presented via a public document, but added that parliamentarians who are friends of Taiwan have made submissions to the China audit, including herself.
Champion also said she hopes Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Indo-Pacific Catherine West, who has been a friend of Taiwan for a long time and knows the region well, would read the China audit report with that knowledge and friendliness.
There are so many conflicts, breaches of human rights and challenges to democracy around the world right now that unless there is a crisis in the Taiwan Strait, the UK really does not have the capacity to focus on it, Champion said, adding that she and other pro-Taiwan MPs are instead making sure Taipei is kept on the agenda.
My priority at the moment is to make as many parliamentarians as possible understand what a great democracy Taiwan is, and the threats the nation face, particularly from the People’s Republic of China, she said.
There is a need to raise awareness, “because, otherwise, I fear what we saw play out very rapidly in Hong Kong, the potential for that to happen in Taiwan, is ever increasing,” she added.
“Selfishly, the most powerful way that I can do that is to tell them the economic impact if there is conflict in the Taiwan Strait, and the catastrophic impact it will have on our economy,” Champion said.
However, that requires parliament to be on the front foot, as tensions between China and Taiwan increase, she said.
“We need to be doing all that we can to intervene,” she added.
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