Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

On Dec. 18, Taiwanese can vote on four referendum questions — whether they agree that a ban on pork imports containing traces of the feed additive ractopamine should be reinstated, whether a liquefied natural gas terminal project should be relocated to protect algal reefs off Taoyuan’s Guanyin District (觀音), whether referendums should be held alongside national elections and whether the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Gongliao District (貢寮) should resume.

The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is sharpening the knives, trying to persuade Taiwanese to vote “yes” on all four, with KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) saying that the referendums are an opportunity for a vote of no confidence in Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) and the government led by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

Taiwan, a steadfast soldier in the fight against authoritarianism, deserves a seat at the US-led virtual Summit for Democracy next month.

Rejuvenating global democracy has been the focus of US President Joe Biden’s foreign policy. His rhetoric on promoting democracy, known as the “Biden doctrine,” has as its core philosophy that contemporary democracies are in a competition to counter non-democratic regimes, such as Russia and China. Biden has pledged that the US would assemble a worldwide network of like-minded nations “to defend democracy globally, to push back authoritarianism’s advance.”