MAC Chairman Jaushieh Joseph Wu: Hoping that China can become a rational regime and cross-strait disputes be peacefully resolved
Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Chairman Jaushieh Joseph Wu stated today (August 24, 2006) that there was much discussion about China's "peaceful rise" at a foreign affairs conference held on August 23, 2006 by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China. However, the rise of China does not necessarily bring about an entirely positive development for the world. In fact, it has had many negative repercussions that require a prudent response. Looking ahead to the future of cross-strait relations, the Taiwanese government hopes that the Beijing authorities can become a rational regime and join Taiwan in establishing a Peace and Stability Framework for Cross-Strait Interactions. This interim arrangement can prevent the occurrence of cross-strait conflicts and set a course towards a permanent and peaceful resolution.
Chairman Wu indicated that the “rise of China" could be analyzed in terms of its economic, diplomatic and military dimensions. On the economic side, due to China's transformation into the “world's factory” and its annual GDP growth in the range of 8 percent to 12 percent, many countries hope that they can enjoy the fruits of this growth. However, for developing countries, on the contrary, the rise of China has been a threat and an unfavorable development since China receives large inflows of capital and dumps back large volumes of cheap products. With regard to finance and banking, moreover, China faces a serious problem of bad debt. Its opaque financial system poses another grave challenge for China under pressure to conform to the WTO regulations.
In the area of diplomacy, China plays an important role in maintaining international security as a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. However, closer inspection of China's actual diplomatic behavior reveals Beijing's ambitions for political expansion. The South Pacific, Africa, and Latin America are all targets of Beijing's urgent desires to expand its political influence. China's deliberate diplomatic plot can also be seen in the Iran crisis and North Korean incident. The existence of the Iran and North Korean issues is in China's interests since they give prominence to Beijing's important role as mediator and weaken the international influence of the United States. On this point the U.S. must surely consider that China has not shouldered its international duties and become a responsible stakeholder.
From the military perspective, China faces no threat from neighboring countries yet it has increased military spending by over 10 percent in each of the past 12 years and procured a considerable amount of advanced and sophisticated offensive weapons. This situation is illustrated by China's military deployment against Taiwan. China has deployed 820 short-range missiles on the southeast coast, posing a serious threat to Taiwan; and it has been producing and deploying a large number of submarines, currently increasing to 50 vessels. U.S. military experts estimate that China could effectively blockade Taiwan with just 12 to 16 submarines, indicating that Beijing's ambitions are certainly not limited to Taiwan and that even Japan should be worried about this situation.
On China's domestic front, the problems of environmental pollution and corruption have cast shadows on China's seemingly vibrant development and encumbered growth. Statistics indicate that 70 percent of China's rivers are heavily polluted, and 90 percent of its water sources are polluted as well. Sixteen of the world's 20 most seriously polluted cities are in China. Moreover, according to official data released by the Chinese authorities, the number of demonstrations held by rural residents has increased annually due to unfair compensation for requisitioned land and other factors, creating a highly unstable variable for society. All of the above phenomena are variables that the world needs to consider when looking at China's economic rise.
For Taiwan, the rise of China represents a major challenge. It also marks a juncture at which the people of Taiwan must make a choice in the face of China's economic, diplomatic and military threats. At present, Taiwan's economy is overly dependent on China. The government not only must weigh the risk factors involved in investing in China, but also must constantly remind the Taiwanese businessmen of the investment risks and personal safety issues. The government should also carefully formulate its economic and trade policy to encourage Taiwan investors to invest in India, Vietnam, Mexico, and even Europe so as to diversify their risk. Furthermore, in view of the differences of public opinion in Taiwan regarding the orientation of cross-strait economic and trade policy, the Executive Yuan convened the Conference on Sustainable Development of Taiwan's Economy (CSDTE) at the end of July 2006 to consolidate the public’s consensus. The government will also concretely implement the consensual opinions reached by the CSDTE. In the face of China's attempts to strip Taiwan of its allies and squeeze Taiwan’s room for survival, we hope that the countries of the world will continue to support Taiwan based on the universal values of democracy and freedom. We also hope to cooperate with the European Union, the United States and Japan to jointly assist poverty-stricken countries in Latin America, Africa and the South Pacific. In order to counter China's military threat, the government hopes that the ruling and opposition political parties can be of one mind in speedily passing the military procurement budget to strengthen Taiwan's self-defense capability. Additionally, the government is actively promoting a policy to allow Chinese tourists to visit Taiwan. This is aimed at enabling the Chinese people to personally experience the lives of people in Taiwan, so that cross-strait relations can be improved. We also hope that in future both sides across the Strait can resume negotiations on substantive issues including cross-strait judicial assistance, financial supervision, currency exchange, the protection of intellectual property rights and others.
Chairman Wu was invited by the Research Center for Humanities and Social Sciences at the Academia Sinica to address the international symposium on "The Rise of China: Beijing’s Strategies and Implications for the Asia-Pacific." His one-hour speech was delivered in English and received an enthusiastic response.