Taiwan alleges China is using cash to win developing nations to its stand on the island

Key Points

• Taiwan’s foreign minister Lin Chia-lung alleges China is using cash and cheap infrastructure projects to persuade developing nations to sever diplomatic ties with Taiwan and endorse Beijing’s “one China” stance.
• China’s economic and diplomatic pressure has reduced Taiwan’s formal diplomatic allies to just 12 countries, with recent defections by the Solomon Islands and Cook Islands and new restrictions from Somalia and South Africa.
• Beijing invokes the 1971 UN resolution that transferred China’s Security Council seat to assert that Taiwan is part of China, effectively barring the island from the United Nations and most other international forums.
• Lin urged Taiwan to harness support from the United States and European Union to counter China’s “legal warfare” aimed at making the Taiwan issue its domestic concern.

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — Taiwan’s foreign minister on Wednesday alleged that China is using cash and other inducements to win over developing countries to its position on the self-governing island but claimed that such tactics are losing their effectiveness,

Lin Chia-lung told reporters that China’s goal is to persuade these nations to cut diplomatic ties with Taiwan, and stand with Beijing on issues it says prove Taiwan is part of China.

Lin offered no proof for his allegations and there was no immediate reaction from Beijing.

The minister said that key to that argument is a 1971 U.N. resolution that handed the China seat at the Security Council to Beijing, effectively kicking out Chiang Kai-shek’s representatives who had held it even after fleeing to Taiwan when the Communists took over China in 1949.

The resolution says nothing about self-governing Taiwan’s representation, but China and its allies have been using it as proof that there is only one China, of which Taiwan is an indivisible part.

Lin also alleged that in developing nations, “China is using cheap construction” of projects from stadiums to railway lines to win the countries over.

“We must not let China have what it wants in terms of using legal warfare to make the Taiwan issue its domestic issue," Lin said, adding that Taiwan needs to harness the support from the United States and the European Union in defying Beijing.

Chinese economic pressure has reduced the number of Taiwan's formal diplomatic allies to just 12, mainly small island nations in the South Pacific and Caribbean. Taiwan also lost allies from among Central American countries in recent years.

In deference to Beijing, the U.S. maintains only unofficial relations with Taipei, but remains its chief economic backer and source of weaponry to defend itself from China's threat to invade the island.

Meanwhile, Chinese diplomatic pressure, often won through gifts to poor nations, has kept Taiwan out of the United Nations and most other international forums, Lin claimed.

China refuses to deal with Taiwan's pro-independence government and has been pressing its diplomatic campaign to isolate the island.

In February, the South Pacific country of Cook Islands signed a largely secret deal with China to boost cooperation on matters such as mining seabed minerals. It provoked a rare diplomatic clash with the Cook Island's chief benefactor, New Zealand, and protests at home.

That came after the Solomon Islands switched ties from Taiwan to China and signed a secret security arrangement with Beijing, despite considerable opposition from political opponents and parts of the public at home.

Most recently, Somalia has said it will cease accepting visitors or transit passengers with Taiwanese passports. South Africa has demanded Taiwan move its unofficial representative office from the capital of Pretoria, to the city of Cape Town.

Before becoming a democracy three decades ago, Taiwan was accused of using similar tactics, but an active legislature and open budgets have made secret payments untenable.