Pushing the UK to improve ties

Originally published by the Taipei Times on 16/02/2022.

Many European nations have been flexing their pro-Taiwan credentials over the past few years. In return, among other gestures of gratitude, the sky over Kaohsiung was adorned with the flags of the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Poland and Slovakia. This year’s Lantern Festival light show is the city’s way of thanking those countries for their donations of COVID-19 vaccines.

Most of these countries had much more to be thanked for. Prague made headlines when it signed a sister-city agreement with Taipei, while Czech politicians have been at the forefront of parliamentary visits to the country. In 2020, Czech Senate President Milos Vystrcil proclaimed to the Legislative Yuan and the international media: “I am Taiwanese.” In a similar vein, Lithuania defied precedent when it opted to call Taiwan’s new de facto embassy in Vilnius the Taiwanese Representative Office. Now, after government and business visits, Taiwan and Slovakia are also looking to set up new trade offices in each other’s countries. Whether “Taiwanese” is used again or the more Beijing-friendly “Taipei,” this is a positive move for Taiwan. Aside from the economic wins, such interactions have significant symbolic value, as each one of these actions help ease the country’s diplomatic isolation.

It is a shame that there are not more European countries that can be congratulated for taking head-on Beijing’s campaign to marginalize Asia’s finest democracy. Why should the rest of Europe, full of far more powerful liberal democracies, leave this responsibility to a few east European countries? Why was the Union Jack not sparkling across the Kaohsiung skyline?

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Review: Challenging Beijing’s Mandate of Heaven

Originally published by The International Journal of Taiwan Studies on 01/02/2022.

‘We Have to Save Our Own Nation Ourselves’ (自己國家自己救) emerged as a memorable slogan from Taiwan’s Sunflower occupation in early 2014. So memorable in fact that a few months later Umbrella activists would proclaim, ‘We Have to Save Our Hong Kong Ourselves’ (自己香港自己救). This is just one striking similarity which makes comparing these social movements so tempting. This is exactly what Ming-Sho Ho, professor of sociology at National Taiwan University, has done in Challenging Beijing’s Mandate of Heaven (2019).

Here we have two movements emerging in the same year with a similar student base, tactics, and with particular appeal among young people. Moreover, both movements directed their fury at leaders who they saw as increasingly accommodating towards Beijing. For the Sunflowers the fear of greater economic integration with China drove their occupation of the Legislative Yuan. While Hongkongers took to the streets in an effort to complete the process of democratisation despite pushback from the mainland.

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Report: Developing a progressive Taiwan policy

 Originally published by the New Diplomacy Project on 24/01/2022.

Beijing has attempted to squeeze Taiwan’s international space by poaching its few remaining diplomatic allies and blocking the country’s participation in international organisations. It has also used coercive economic tools to punish the government in Taipei. Such measures are designed to demoralise the Taiwanese people and impress on them the supposed inevitability of unification.

Taiwan matters to the UK. It is a fellow liberal democracy which has much to offer and teach the rest of the world, with its response to Covid-19 being a case in point. Its location in the first island chain makes it critical to the future order in the Indo-Pacific. Likewise, as a leading producer of semiconductors an armed conflict over Taiwan could cause severe disruption to the global economy.

Calculating the risks of war is incredibly difficult. The balance of military power across the Strait has unquestionably shifted in China’s favour. The Chinese military is also developing the capabilities to launch an amphibious landing of the main island.

However, a decision to annex Taiwan will be a political one and as such an assessment of Xi Jinping’s language and priorities is needed. The risk of armed conflict should not be overplayed, attention should instead be directed to supporting Taiwan with the problems it faces now.

The Labour Party should treat Taiwan as a partner by stepping up engagement with government officials and Taiwanese civil society. It should also push the UK government harder to support efforts to allow Taiwan to meaningfully participate in international organisations and support efforts to enhance Taiwan’s economic resilience.

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Time to Confront China’s ‘Counterterrorism’ Claims in Xinjiang

Originally published by The Diplomat on 06/07/2021.

On July 5, 2009, unrest erupted in Xinjiang’s capital, Urumqi, in response to the murder of two Uyghur laborers by Han colleagues in Guangdong. Clashes between Uyghurs and Han Chinese, including the police, lasted until July 7, 2009, resulting in the deaths of nearly 200 people. Since then, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has used the language of extremism and terrorism to justify its assault on the region’s Muslim population.

Xi Jinping, on his first visit to Xinjiang as president in 2014, labelled the region the “front line against terrorism.” During and after his trip, in a series of conversations with party officials, Xi laid the groundwork for an all-out “struggle against terrorism, infiltration and separatism.” He urged his comrades to show “absolutely no mercy.”

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Biden’s Multilateral Approach to China Is Paying Off

Originally published by The Diplomat on 15/06/2021.

The G-7 may not have evolved into a permanent Democratic 10 (D10), but last weekend’s summit in Cornwall demonstrated the value of U.S. President Joe Biden’s multilateralist approach to China. Not only are liberal democracies more united, but the now have before them a practical initiative to rival Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

In the runup to this year’s G-7 meeting, there was speculation that the meeting of leaders from the world’s leading democracies would be the launch pad for a D10 grouping. With the United Kingdom hosting, Prime Minister Boris Johnson took the initiative to invite fellow democracies Australia, India, and South Korea to the summit (subsequently, South Africa was also invited to join). The D10, as envisioned by Johnson’s team, would address issues relating to supply chains and 5G telecommunications.

While both issues are intrinsically linked to China, proposers of the D10 nevertheless insisted that it would not be an anti-China alliance. Yet such denials, genuine or not, failed to convince those cautious European nations keen to preserve their own distinctive, and less combative, approach to Beijing. These early signals should have made it clear that a formal D10 was not in the cards.

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Beijing’s plan to pick the next Dalai Lama

Originally published by The Spectator on 24/05/2021.

Imagine for a moment that Cuba picked the next Pope. That is the scenario which Lobsang Sangay, the then-Sikyong (the Tibetan government-in-exile’s head of state), asked the world to consider several years ago in light of growing concerns that the Chinese Communist party (CCP) would seek to select the next Dalai Lama. Now such a possibility – that Beijing will attempt to impose their own man at the top of Tibetan Buddhism – seems increasingly plausible.

Last week, China’s State Council issued a white paper on Tibet to mark 70 years since the signing of the Seventeen Point Agreement, which incorporated Tibet into the People’s Republic of China. The title of the document – 'Tibet since 1951: Liberation, development and prosperity' – makes it all too clear this is CCP propaganda at its worst. It attempts to rewrite history by failing to acknowledge that this agreement was signed under duress. It also ignores the fact that Beijing has not upheld its promises to grant the Tibetan people autonomy, in particular the right to practice their own religion free from interference.

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We Don’t Need to Wait on the UN to Expand Taiwan’s International Role

Originally published by The Diplomat on 06/05/2021.

The G-7 Foreign Ministers’ May 5 statement in support of Taiwan’s participation in the World Health Organization (WHO) is welcome but not sufficient. Liberal democracies can and should do more to undermine China’s efforts to isolate Taiwan. Moreover, given Beijing’s substantial influence within key international organizations they will need to be creative.

The news was welcome for several reasons, most notably because it is the first joint statement of this kind since the outbreak of COVID-19. Previously, supporters of Taiwan have been left wanting as the world’s liberal democracies either remained silent or offered piecemeal remarks. The communique’s clarity is also a step in the right direction. A 2019 G-7 statement in relation to the blocking of Taiwan from the International Civil Aviation Organization vaguely spoke of including “all active members of the international aviation community.” This one came right out with it and mentioned “Taiwan” directly.

Yet the statement remains a symbolic gesture. While it will help to ease the effects of Taiwan’s forced isolation, it will do nothing to solve the issue of the country’s continued exclusion from WHO forums and the World Health Assembly. This is a whole other challenge.

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