Kuomintang

With Mere Days Before Elections, Missile Alert About Chinese Satellite Launch Leads to Confusion, Panic

Brian Hioe
A text message alert sounded this afternoon in Taiwan shortly after 3 PM, alerting that a rocket had been fired over Taiwan. What ensued, however, was significant confusion between the English and Chinese. The Chinese stated that a “satellite” had been fired over Taiwan by China. By contrast, the English stated that a “missile” had been fired over Taiwan...
Cross StraitEnglishInternationalJanuary 2023PoliticsRegional Tensions6 min read

“The Will of the Chinese People”: Beijing’s Narrative of Invading Taiwan

Kuang-shun Yang
For decades, Taiwan has lived under Beijing’s constant military threat of “reunification.” However, Taiwan is often portrayed by Chinese propagandists as a “troublemaker” capable of destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region or making China “upset about everything we [Taiwan] do, about our existence,” as Taiwan’s ex-ambassador to the United States Hsiao Bi-khim noted. Taiwan’s independence, be it a political appeal or an objective reality, is provocative to the CCP. The CCP’s mouthpieces have effectively convinced numerous international observers to discourage Taiwan’s quest for independence and characterized Taiwan’s autonomy as an affront to the Chinese people....
Cross StraitEnglishInternationalJanuary 20239 min read

TPP Seeks to Cut Ties with Former Spokesperson Over Chinese Funding

Brian Hioe
The TPP has found itself in hot water over Ma Chi-wei, a former party spokesperson who is now running as an independent legislative candidate, who was found to have received funds from the Chinese government to support her campaign. The funds were transferred through cryptocurrency, ironically enough, as the first major public incident in which the CCP has been found to distribute funds through cryptocurrency to candidates it backs in Taiwan...
EnglishJanuary 2023Politics5 min read

Does “Hong Kong Influence” Linger in the 2024 Taiwan Election?

Sanho Chung
It has been widely recognized that Hong Kong’s Anti-Extradition Movement in 2019 was the turning point of the 2020 General Election in Taiwan. In the last general election, Beijing’s hardline crackdown on the protests in Hong Kong gave rise to the Taiwanese’s mistrust of China and finally brought a big win to the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which was expected to lose both their majority over the Legislative Yuan and their presidency. But after three years of National Security Law (NSL) enactment in Hong Kong, the Hong Kong issue in this general election seems no longer as focal as it was. How should we make sense of this huge contrast in attention? Has “Hong Kong Influence” faded out totally...
Cross StraitEnglishInternationalJanuary 2023PoliticsRegional Tensions11 min read