Last Wednesday, the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council and the State Council Information Office published a white paper titled “The Taiwan Question and China’s Reunification in the New Era”.
The white paper, which gives a full account of the fundamental principle and policies for resolving the Taiwan question, distinctly demonstrates the Chinese government’s confidence in realizing national reunification as well as its resolution to defeat separatist forces in Taiwan and foreign interference.
A spokesperson of the Taiwan Work Office of the CPC Central Committee later expressed in a statement the hope for all compatriots in Hong Kong, Macao and overseas to contribute to the normalization of cross-Straits relations and peaceful reunification with Taiwan.
Under the umbrella of one China, it is the will of all Chinese people, including residents of Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, to realize national reunification. The white paper reminds us Hong Kong is blessed with the distinctive advantage of having the staunch backing of the motherland and its connectivity to the world. It is well-positioned to play the facilitator role in advancing national reunification.
The white paper points out that “throughout China’s 5,000-year history, national reunification and opposition to division have remained a common ideal and a shared tradition of the whole nation”, and that “Taiwan has been an integral part of China’s territory since ancient times”.
The subversive agenda of the Democratic Progressive Party authorities and its collusion with foreign forces have posed major threats to the legitimate cause of national reunification. Sinophobes in the United States have intensified their effort to contain China with their “Taiwan card”. US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan has breached the one-China principle and the three joint communiques issued by the US and China in 1972, 1979 and 1982, undermining the political foundation of US-China relations, severely infringing on China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and upsetting peace and stability of the Taiwan Straits. It has also sent a wrong signal that will embolden the pro-independence forces on the island.
In response, the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council imposed sanctions on some organizations associated with die-hard “Taiwan independence” advocates; the Foreign Ministry likewise imposed sanctions against Pelosi and her immediate family. It was later revealed that Pelosi’s husband and son own massive investments and assets on the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong through investment funds.
As Hong Kong is part of China, it is incumbent upon the city to cooperate with the central authorities in implementing those sanction measures. In a laudable move, Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu and many principal officials of the HKSAR government have unambiguously expressed their full support for the necessary steps taken by Beijing to safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The white paper makes it clear that the central authorities in Beijing will work with the greatest sincerity and exert its utmost efforts to achieve peaceful reunification but will not renounce the use of force as the last resort to be taken under compelling circumstances. It is clear that peaceful reunification is the prioritized option, whereas the use of force remains the last resort and targets only the separatists.
The requirement for member states to respect other countries’ sovereignty and territorial integrity is a cardinal principle of the UN Charter, and is the cornerstone of modern international law and relations. As preserving national unity and territorial integrity is an inviolable right of every sovereign country, and the government of the People’s Republic of China is the sole legal government representing the whole of China, the legitimacy of the Chinese government resolving the Taiwan question and realizing national reunification is beyond any doubt. Any means to achieve this goal is in full compliance with the country’s national laws, international laws and international norms.
The US and its G7 allies demonstrated twisted logic when they accused Beijing of trying to “unilaterally” change the status quo of the Taiwan Straits when they were fully aware that the DPP authorities have been dismantling the one-China status quo. And they must have theorized that they have a say in the process of China’s national reunification, notwithstanding that it is China’s internal affair and brooks no foreign interference.
Beijing never wishes to wage a war against Chinese compatriots living on Taiwan Island. It keeps calling for the resumption of cross-Straits talks on peaceful reunification under the one-China principle. However, such calls have fallen on deaf ears. The Democratic Progressive Party authorities on the island responded with open advocacy of a new “two states” theory. They seek “incremental Taiwan independence” by resorting to various de-Sinicization efforts, and try every means to achieve so-called “de jure Taiwan independence”. The DPP authorities’ collusions with foreign forces, including Nancy Pelosi’s “official visit”, are part of those maneuvers.
Confronted by the growing threat from the separatist forces in Taiwan, Beijing has to retain the use-of-force option as deterrence. The People’s Liberation Army’s largest-ever military exercises encircling Taiwan, which kicked off after Pelosi’s Taiwan trip, were seen by some observers as a rehearsal for a potential nonpeaceful reunification. They also reckoned that the PLA demonstrated in these live-fire drills its full capacity to take over the island by force once nonpeaceful reunification becomes the only option. The secessionists in Taiwan and the external forces that poke their noses into the process of China’s national reunification are to be reminded: Underestimate China’s determination and military might at your own risk.
The author is a Hong Kong member of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and chairman of the Hong Kong New Era Development Thinktank.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.