Cross Strait

China’s New Economic Incentives Offered to Taiwan Are a Repeat of Old Tactics

Brian Hioe
The Chinese government announcing 26 new measures aimed at attracting Taiwanese firms is clearly a measure aimed at influencing Taiwanese elections, with just over sixty days left before January 2020 elections. However, what may be noteworthy is to what extent the Chinese government is falling back on tactics it has tried before in the past to influence elections, rather than coming up with new tactics... Read More
Cross StraitEnglishInternationalNovember 20190 Comments 06 min read

Detention of Taiwanese Pro-Unification Advocate in China for Over 420 Days Raises Worrying Possibilities

Brian Hioe
The revelation that Taiwanese academic Tsai Chin-shu has been detained by China for over 420 days should be highly worrying. That Tsai was detained for over 400 days with no information coming to light about his imprisonment suggests a higher number of Taiwanese currently detained by the Chinese government than was previously known. Likewise, Tsai was a known advocate of unification with China, suggesting that China will not only target pro-independence activists for arbitrary detention... Read More
Cross StraitEnglishInternationalSeptember 20190 Comments 08 min read

The Cross-Straits Oversight Bill Reemerges as an Issue

Brian Hioe
It may be ironic that five years after the Sunflower Movement’s monthlong legislature of the Legislative Yuan in 2014, one of the demands dating back to the movement has floated up again as a public issue. Namely, one of the key demands of the movement was that a cross-strait oversight bill be passed in order to strengthen civic oversight over the passage of future cross-strait bills... Read More
April 2019Cross StraitEnglishInternational0 Comments 05 min read

Why Does China Hope to Accomplish Through Deploying Fighter Planes in the Taiwan Straits?

Brian Hioe
Two Chinese J-11 fighter aircraft crossed the median line of the Taiwan Straits at 11 AM yesterday morning, provoking strong reactions from within Taiwan and prompting the Taiwanese air force to mobilize five fighter planes in response. The incident was a break from precedent, seeing as while Chinese regularly fields planes in the Taiwan Straits, they do not usually cross the median line of the Taiwan Straits... Read More
April 2019Cross StraitEnglishInternational1 Comment 06 min read