Revolting Story of EU Kow-tow to China

Here's something sick from the Economist:

China tells the EU to dump on Taiwan. The EU asks “How hard?”

ASK officials in Brussels about relations between China and the European Union, and you will soon hear the word “values”. A recent EU strategy paper on China calls on Europe to pursue a “dynamic relationship with China based on our values”, notably including democracy and human rights.

Try telling that to Taiwan. It is about to receive a stern EU injunction to act “sensibly and responsibly” by scrapping a planned referendum asking voters whether they would like the island to seek membership of the United Nations under its historic name, the “Republic of China”, or just “Taiwan”.

What could be sicker than the EU serving China? Not much. BTW folks, the Republic of China is not Taiwan's historic name, but its official one.

Why is the EU meddling? Taiwan is a thriving democracy and big trading partner (almost as important as India or Brazil). The explanation is simple and unedifying: the EU is doing China's bidding. Chinese rulers regard the Taiwan referendum as a sneaky step closer to an eventual declaration of formal independence by the island.

The conventional wisdom is that China is concerned about a formal declaration of independence by Taiwan. But they have to know that there is neither the political consensus nor the Constitutional possibility of such an event occurring. Since they have the veto in the UN, they also know that Taiwan will never enter the UN under its own name.

So what is Beijing up to? They know from their pals in the KMT that the UN referendum is an election year ploy that will have no real effect on anything. So this isn't about "Taiwan independence" really. It's about stopping or defusing an election year ploy, on behalf of its allies, the KMT. It is also part of its long-term policy of making Chen Shui-bian look like a "radical."

The Economist then goes on to explain what is going on:

China expends extraordinary energy on pestering other governments to preserve the strange limbo inhabited by Taiwan, a self-governing island of 23m that it insists is a wayward province. Whenever Taiwan irks China, its ambassadors appear at foreign ministries worldwide, demanding that Taiwan be rebuked.

An internal EU memorandum sheds light on the way such strong-arm diplomacy works. Prepared by officials working under Javier Solana, the EU's foreign-policy supremo, it describes a meeting, late last month, between the Chinese ambassador to the EU, Guan Chengyuan, and a top Eurocrat. According to EU note-takers, Mr Guan called the referendum provocative and destabilising, and said China wanted EU support, as it did not want to have to use “the last resort”—an apparent reference to its threat to use force, if necessary, to “reunify” Taiwan.

The memorandum records Mr Guan's EU host as agreeing that a referendum is against Taiwan's own interests, and offering to send a “clear and forceful” message to Taipei to that effect. America, which has many reasons to seek China's diplomatic goodwill, has publicly rebuked Taiwan over the referendum. The EU, in contrast, will stick to private warnings for the moment, to avoid “playing into the hands” of Taiwan's “populist” president, Chen Shui-bian, by giving him “undesirable” publicity.

Portugal, which took over the six-month rotating presidency of the EU this month, has duly drafted a private warning to Taiwan, saying that a referendum risks raising tensions and would be “unhelpful”. A parallel message is to be sent to China, urging restraint.

The Economist writer then demonstrates a good grip on things, rare in foreign correspondents:

UN membership for Taiwan is a long-lost cause, and Mr Chen's referendum plan is at heart an electoral ploy ahead of next year's presidential poll. But that is the sort of thing that happens in a democracy. One dissenting EU diplomat says the Union is pretending there is “moral equivalence” between Taiwanese election politics and Chinese threats of violence. Certainly, this is not how most people understand the EU's oft-professed values.

Remember how the EU criticized Estonia for removing markers of Russian colonialism there, and for wanting to join the UN? Hey wait....that never happened. Hypocrisy, thy name is politics.

Meanwhile back in Taiwan, former DPP presidential candidate Peng Ming-min, who has been working on independence for the island since the 1960s, had a few public words for the EU yesterday.

A former senior presidential adviser, Peng Ming-min (彭明敏) said on Thursday that although the EU considers the lucrative Chinese market important, it should give Taiwan's democracy a chance.

Speaking at a seminar hosted by the Taipei Representative Office in Belgium, Peng said that poor cross-strait relations still posed a danger, even though other problems across the globe have meant that the international community has paid less attention to the issue.

While cross-strait economic relations are increasing, progress was lacking on the political front, Peng said.

MISINFORMED

Peng said many of the perceptions held by Western countries on cross-strait issues were incorrect and disputable, including the "one China" policy, the emphasis on the maintenance of the "status quo," and calls for Taiwan to engage in a dialogue with China and not to provoke China.

Taking the "one China" policy as an example, Peng pointed out that Taiwan, which has been operating independently over the past several decades, is a sovereign and democratic political entity.

"The claim that Taiwan, which is totally different from China, is `part of China' is obviously made with disregard to this reality," Peng said.

On the "status quo" that some countries had asked both sides of the Taiwan Strait to maintain, Peng argued that no one was able to define the concept because the situation was always changing.

For instance, Peng said, China's military buildup is a strategy to change the status quo, while Taiwan's arms procurement and even economic growth are also changing the status quo.

"After taking into account all these factors, the so-called `status quo' is totally meaningless," he said.

It's a shame that the EU is taking the anti-democracy position here. At least they did not do so publicly.

Longtime commentator Ting-i Tsai also had an excellent article on the referendum bid in the Asia Times:

The DPP could present the referendum as a move to expand Taiwan's diplomatic space in the face of rejection, but most academics in Washington see it as an exercise in political cynicism, designed to capitalize on the failure of Taiwan's UN bid in September by consolidating voters' anger toward mainland China.

Harvey Feldman, senior fellow for Asian studies at the Heritage Foundation, a co-author of the US Taiwan Relations Act, and one of the creators of the American Institute in Taiwan, noted that the idea "is mostly an attempt to mobilize the [ruling 'pan-green' coalition] base and make sure it votes. As far as getting into the UN is concerned, it is an essentially meaningless gesture."

Dennis Hickey, professor of the Missouri State University's political science department, echoed Feldman, arguing, "In Washington's view, domestic politics is driving the Chen administration to once again engage in provocative behavior - activities that outrage Beijing - in order to realize some domestic political gains."

But Hickey added that the referendum may not have long-term repercussions: "A termination of American support for Taiwan is not in the cards - after all, Chen is a lame duck."

What will happen? Nothing. The referendum will be held, it will pass or fail, UN entry will fail, the smoke will clear, everyone will realize that nothing has happened, and life will go on. China might complain, but note that it never takes concrete moves -- it never seizes businesses or blocks investment or refuses visas to Taiwanese. "Being provoked" is an event that happens only in the international media. It doesn't take place in the real world.

As I said, this isn't about responding to Taiwan independence. That is only the excuse. The international media is reading China's move incorrectly, I think. This is about helping out the KMT in its quest to gain the presidency by getting other nations to put pressure on the DPP to stop engaging in an internationally meaningless election ploy that will help the DPP get elected.

[Taiwan] [US] [China] [EU] [European Union]