Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Standing up to Chinese hegemony

Taipei Times Editorial

When former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe in 2021 said that a contingency in Taiwan would also be an emergency for Japan, it was taken as a warning that Tokyo would have to get involved if conflict erupted in the Taiwan Strait — if not to defend its national security, then certainly to address a transformed security environment if the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) were to annex Taiwan.

What seemed to be an insightful comment then is now — less than three years later — generally regarded to be the case. This is just one measure of how much the regional dynamic has changed. The CCP and its fellow travelers put the blame squarely on the US and its foreign policy, while others say it is the CCP’s behavior that has changed the landscape.

This is not a chicken-and-egg scenario. It is not difficult to see which party is responsible for increasing regional tensions.

US, China warn each other on Taiwan

Taipei Times

US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan stressed the importance of stability in the Taiwan Strait, while a senior Chinese military official warned the US to stop “collusion” with Taiwan in a rare one-on-one meeting yesterday, both sides said.

Sullivan arrived in Beijing on Tuesday, the first US national security adviser to visit China since 2016, for three days of talks with Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) and other high-ranking officials.

Yesterday morning, Sullivan met with Zhang Youxia (張又俠), vice chairman of the Central Military Commission and China’s second-highest-ranking military official, at the Beijing headquarters of the commission.

Politics should be focused on public interest

Mike Chang 張昭仁

In 2022, the public was stirred by New York’s new Republican representative George Santos, whose entire past, including his background, his education and his work experience, all turned out to be false. Santos, who is of Brazilian descent, claimed to have Jewish ancestry; he had also never been a varsity athlete of a prestigious school, nor worked in a renowned investment firm.

Moreover, it was revealed that Santos had spent political donations on personal luxury items, and the US Congress in December last year voted to expel him. Facing several federal fraud charges, Santos last week pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing.

Taipei open to joint forces with Manila

Taipei Times

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday hinted that Taiwan might join forces with the Philippines to protect navigational freedoms, days after Beijing blocked Philippine supply ships in the South China Sea.

The ministry made the comment when asked whether Taipei would be willing to join forces with the Philippines to protect the latter from increasingly aggressive activities by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy and China Coast Guard.

Taiwan “is willing to cooperate with any other nation with shared values in areas of common concern, including maintaining peace, stability and prosperity in the Indo-Pacfic region,” it wrote in a statement.

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