CHEN ASSERTS TAIWAN IS UNLIKELY EVER TO RETURN TO CHINESE RULE

[shan]

FT news

Taiwan is very unlikely ever to return to Chinese rule, Chen Shui-bian, Taiwan's outgoing president, said yesterday, claiming the preservation of the island state's de facto independence as his political legacy.

“Some people may say the window of opportunity for Taiwan independence has already closed. But I agree even more with the view that the opportunity of Taiwan and the Chinese mainland merging, unifying, is becoming ever more remote,” Mr Chen said.

Mr Chen's comments will be seen as a provocative parting shot in Beijing, which regards Taiwan as a renegade province and has threatened invasion if its Democratic Progressive party government moves towards formal independence.

 

Frank Hsieh, the DPP's candidate for presidential elections due on March 22, is trailing Ma Ying-jeou of the more China-friendly Kuomintang in most opinion polls. However, Mr Ma's lead in part reflects a pledge not to discuss unification with Beijing if he wins.

In an interview on Air Force One, his presidential aircraft, Mr Chen also challenged the claim that China's Communist government inherited sovereignty over Taiwan when it won China's civil war against Kuomintang nationalist forces in 1949.

This argument rests on the claim that sovereignty over the island, a Japanese colony from 1895 to 1945, was passed to the Republic of China in the 1943 Cairo Declaration by Franklin Roosevelt, US president, Winston Churchill, UK prime minister, and Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, then China's ruler, in 1943.

“Very clearly, [the declaration] does not carry a date. And secondly, the three leaders did not sign it. Moreover, afterwards they did not affirm it, let alone authorise its validity,” Mr Chen said.

Taiwanese pro-independence campaigners have long argued that China never regained sovereignty over Taiwan after Japan's defeat in the second world war. However, this is the first time that a Taiwanese president has embraced the argument.

Mr Chen claimed that Mr Churchill had said in the UK parliament in February 1955 that he did not agree with the view that China held sovereignty over Taiwan based on the declaration.

A referendum to be held next week alongside the election on whether Taiwan should try to join the United Nations is seen as Mr Chen's boldest move so far in asserting independence.

[The Smoking Man]

What a fucking moron this guy is.

Doesn't Chen realize that Taiwan represented all of China in the UN until 1972???

They were quite content to be 'China' until that point.

You can't take your ball and bat and go home when things don't quite go as you expected ... Especially, when it appears 'home' IS China.