World > >Terrorism & Security
posted February 23, 2006 at 11:00 a.m.

China warns Taiwan to stay course on unification

Warning comes day after Taiwanese president calls for abolishment of government unification body.

By Arthur Bright | csmonitor.com

China issued a warning that Taiwan should stay the course toward eventual unification with the mainland Thursday, a day after Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian called for the abolition of the National Unification Council.

The Financial Times reports that Mr. Chen called for the end of the council, a Taiwanese government body established in 1990 to advise on reunification, in a Wednesday meeting in Taipei with US Rep. Rob Simmons (R) of Connecticut. Chen described the council and the National Unification Guidelines that it promotes as the "absurd product of an absurd era." [ Editor's note: The original version mischaracterized the National Unification Council.]


02/22/06 Dome of Shiite shrine destroyed in attack 02/21/06 Arab nations say they will offset funds withheld by Israel 02/20/06 Report: Pentagon ignored repeated warnings on torture and abuse

Sign up to be notified daily: Find out more. Subscribe via RSS: What is this?

The comments marked unprecedented defiance of the US, Taiwan's sole protector, which had urged his administration to back down from any plan to scrap the the moribund 15-year-old council.

Beijing [Wednesday] warned that Mr Chen's call was a "dangerous signal of further escalation of splittist 'Taiwan independence' activities". State media quoted Chen Yunlin, head of the Chinese cabinet's Taiwan Affairs Office, as saying: "If he clings obstinately to his course, it will cause serious damage to cross-Strait ties and ultimately [will cause] inevitable harm to the personal interests of Taiwanese compatriots."

Reuters reports that China repeated its warning Thursday in a signed commentary by the state-run Xinhua news agency, saying that Chen's move was a power play meant to divert attention from Taiwan's struggling economy. "He has placed all the stakes on provocation and creating crises," the commentary said, adding that Chen was sacrificing "the safety and well-being of Taiwan people" for his own political gain.

Reuters adds that Liu Jianchao, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman, made a thinly veiled call for the US to rein Chen in during a Thursday news conference. "We hope the concerned countries will be vigilant about the wrong and even dangerous actions of Taiwan independence forces," he said.

The Taipei Times reports that the US, which is bound by law to defend Taiwan in case of Chinese invasion, confirmed its commitment to maintaining the status quo in a Tuesday meeting with Chinese Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Yang Jiechi in Washington.

In the sessions with Yang, "we reiterated the view that Taiwan needs to refrain from taking actions which can be seen as unilateral efforts to change the status quo," State Department spokesman Adam Ereli told reporters as the talks were progressing.

The US also told the Chinese that Taiwan "need[s] to move to address the issues they have with respect to China through dialogue, and that's our consistent message in our dealings with the Taiwanese," Ereli said.

That message seemed subtly different to earlier US comments on cross-strait dialogue, in which the US has focused on the need for China to deal with Chen and his government, rather than going through indirect talks with the opposition [unificationist] parties.

Chen, a member of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party, has "made boat-rocking his hallmark," Reuters reports. That hallmark may be wearing US patience thin, as it tries to balance its military obligations to Taiwan with its political ties to China. [ Editor's note: The original version misnamed Chen's party.]

"Chen is pushing the envelope and forcing the United States to draw a line to show him where the limit is," said George Tsai, a research fellow at the Institute of International Relations....

"Abolishing the unification council cannot be considered de jure independence, but there is little doubt he is moving toward that direction," said Chao Chien-min, who teaches political science at National Chengchi University. "The United States will no longer trust Chen Shui-bian. This is the last straw."

In the current rancor over the National Unification Council, both Chen and the Chinese government claim popular support. In a Taipei Times commentary, Huang Tien-lin, a national policy adviser to Chen, writes "both the council and the guidelines aim to achieve a purpose – eventual cross-strait 'unification' – that does not enjoy the support of the general public. Only those who favor unification with China would support retaining the council and the guidelines." In addition, he blamed Taiwan's economic woes on unification.

The policy of "active opening" has done great damage to Taiwan's economy. In excess of 40 percent of Taiwan's manufacturing now takes place abroad, mainly in China. In the manufacture of information technology products, the figure is 73.6 percent, and 100 percent for notebook computers.

Ninety percent of Taiwan's foreign investments are now in China. This has, in turn, hurt business in Taiwan's major commercial ports. Exports have fallen, damaging Taiwan's position as a transshipment hub. As a result, China's high-technology output is now the world's second largest. And no other nation is more dependent on China than Taiwan.

However, the People's Daily Online, the offical newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party, reports that 45 percent of the Taiwanese people are opposed to the abolition of the National Unification Council, according to a poll by the United Daily News, a unificationist Taiwanese newspaper. The poll also addressed Taiwanese sentiments toward reunification.

On the issue of the cross-Straits relations, 10 percent of the surveyed "wish a reunification as soon as possible"; 12 percent of them favor "first keeping the status quo and then reunification"; 41 percent favor "making the status quo permanent".

It can be seen that 63 percent of the surveyed now demand either reunification or "maintaining the status quo".

Regardless of the popularity of abolishing the National Unification Council, Chen and his party have suffered a number of political setbacks in 2005 as China pushed its agenda in Taiwan, according to a January 2006 article in The Christian Science Monitor.

In the past year, mainland China has made unprecedented inroads into Taiwan's political culture, with emotional spring visits by Taiwanese opposition leaders Lien Chan and James Soong to Beijing, and new talk of tourism, trade, shared ethnicity, and peace across the strait.

As a result, President Chen's Democratic People's Party, a bastion of pro-Taiwan sentiment, has witnessed a dramatic, sudden reversal of popularity - most recently in humiliating local elections [in December].

Since then, Chen has spoken more heatedly about China and Taiwanese independence. Analysts believe these statements are meant to score domestic political points.