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Taiwan inaugurates new president
by Sanjay Jha | May 19, 2008 at 11:38 pm | 158 views | 2 comments
An almnus of Harvard Law school and former mayor of Taipei had been sworn in as new President of Taiwan. 57 yr old Ma Ying-jeou is the chairman of the Nationalist Party and contested election on the plank of improved relations with mighty neighhbour China. China doesn't recognise independent Taiwan.
A proponent of improved ties with China took office as Taiwan's president Tuesday, elected on promises to seek greater economic cooperation with its larger rival and ease six decades of tensions.
The inauguration of Ma Ying-jeou, 57, Ma represents a clear break from the eight-year presidency of Chen Shui-bian, whose confrontational pro-independence policies often led to friction with Beijing — and with the United States, Taiwan's most important foreign partner.
Vice president Vincent Siew, 69, was sworn in shortly after Ma, together with Premier Liu Chao-shiuan and his Cabinet.
In contrast to the independence bent of Chen's Democratic Progressive Party, Ma's Nationalists have never formally renounced a desire for eventual unification with China, from which Taiwan split amid civil war in 1949.
Fifty-nine years after their split, China still claims Taiwan as part of its territory, and has repeatedly threatened to attack if the island makes its de facto independence permanent.
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May 19, 2008 at 11:38 pm by Sanjay Jha, 158 views, 2 comments
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Comments (2)
at 00:06 on May 20th, 2008
This looks like it takes Taiwan one step closer to officially being a part of China.
at 09:29 on May 20th, 2008
Sanjay Jha, I like this story. It's good stuff.
Taiwan's independence movement has been fading for the better part of the last decade. China's at a point now where there's massive amounts of foreign direct investment transferring both ways across the strait. China has also shown twice now that it has the potential to make the Taiwanese stock market plunge overnight by firing a couple of missiles into the straight. It seems that with this new leader, we'll see quite an improvement in cross straight relations, though things have been improving even over the last half decade.
The "Taiwan question" is a fascinating one, with about 50 years of foreign policy history behind it, both in China and the U.S. This is just another step in that history...the three communiques, Kissinger, Brezinski, Clinton's three "noes", etc. etc. It's funny, if you ask a random person on the street if they support Taiwan independence, they'll probably shoot back with, "Of course!" Every president since Nixon, I believe, has been on China's side of the issue, apart from the "peaceful resolution" stipulation, though China has agreed "not to dispute" this stipulation (rather than outright agreeing with it -Chinese Foreign Policy is fascinating kids). I don't think there are many people, governments, or world leaders who would be happy to hear of Taiwan suddenly declaring independence.
Robert Ross is pretty well respected in the political science arena:
http://taiwansecurity.org/IS/2006/FA-Ross.pdf