How China is meddling in Taiwan election

DW (English)

With Taiwanese gearing up to vote, China is wielding its influence as a mighty trade partner. Beijing is keen to end the government's course to make Taiwan less dependent on China, which still sees the country as part of its territory.

Transcript

00:00 On Saturday, people here in Taiwan will decide their next president.

00:04 China, which claims the Democratic island as its own territory, has been ramping up

00:10 efforts to influence the election.

00:12 One of the methods is through economic coercion.

00:15 Taiwan's ruling party, the DPP, has tried to lessen the island's reliance on China,

00:21 while opposition parties said they want closer ties with the world's second biggest economy.

00:27 And since China is still Taiwan's biggest trading partner, Beijing has been framing

00:32 the upcoming vote as a choice between economic prosperity or depression.

00:38 We have more than 20 years of facing all kinds of economic coercion or pressure from China.

00:45 And that has included export restriction, for example, import restriction.

00:52 And also from time to time, some of our business people in China also face politicized threats

01:00 from China with regards to their operation.

01:04 And very recently, people may understand that China has targeted certain sectors, for example,

01:12 agriculture, fishing.

01:14 And we believe that kind of targeting this very important sector now, because it's kind

01:21 of the sector that with farmers mostly tend to support the current ruling party.

01:30 Last month, China published an investigation accusing Taiwan of putting up trade barriers

01:35 that breach international rules, as well as a trade deal signed by the two sides back

01:39 in 2010.

01:40 Following the investigation, China stopped tariff reduction for 12 petrochemical products

01:47 from Taiwan.

01:49 This has made companies in the field worried.

01:52 Taiwanese chemical giant Formosa Plastics said in a statement that the action will have

01:57 a significant impact, and they hope the cross-strait relations can be stabilized.

02:02 ECFA is the Cross-Strait Economic Framework Agreement, which was signed back in 2010 and

02:09 entered into force for already 10 years.

02:12 And in the past few years, China has never touched upon that, because that agreement

02:19 was signed under President Ma Ying-jeou's administration.

02:23 It was a very important base for Taiwan and China to establish very close and friendly

02:30 relations.

02:31 So for the first time, China threatens to actually already did to take back some of

02:37 the benefits means that this is going to be an area that China is to leverage in the future.

02:46 But in other areas, China is taking a different approach.

02:49 Recently, Beijing greenlit imports of grouper, a type of fish that had been banned for more

02:54 than a year.

02:55 And this happened right after a visit to China by the vice chairman of the KMT, Taiwan's

03:01 main opposition party.

03:04 Initially, when China banned the import of grouper fish, the farmers were very pessimistic.

03:11 But since the Taiwanese government started trying to help, the industry has stabilized.

03:16 So I think China's banning and then opening up of Taiwan's fishery products is losing

03:21 impact on the election.

03:24 Mainland China is our biggest market, but there are other countries around the world

03:28 that are worth developing.

03:30 I've seen some farmers and companies actively expanding into the US and Japan.

03:35 In the past elections, I think there are seven elections already, presidential election,

03:42 that didn't actually work a lot towards China's interest or towards China's favor.

03:50 Sometimes it's on the opposite.

03:52 As people, it will only make people here more angry or more cautious about China's hidden

04:02 agenda.

04:03 As one of the world's most closely watched elections is around the corner, whether or

04:08 not China is going to double down its economic coercion should really depend on the final

04:14 result.

04:14 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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