00:00Taiwan President Lai Ching-de just postponed his trip to Eswatini after three countries refused to give his plane permission
00:05to fly over them.
00:06The government says that this is due to Chinese pressure.
00:08But what do you think this says about the future of Taiwan's diplomatic trips?
00:12Will Lai or future presidents be able to engage in diplomacy if China can pressure countries along the route to
00:17refuse them permission?
00:18Well, most of our diplomatic allies, except Eswatini and Vatican, might be similar.
00:26The others are in Pacific Islands and also in Caribbean Islands and Latin America, Central and South America.
00:36Except Paraguay, I think other countries usually, you know, if we actually have, again, a charter flight only for the
00:48president,
00:49this is the area of U.S. dominance, and there's a lot of open space, like flying to the U
00:56.S.
00:57You basically, you know, it's all open airspace, not a lot of territorial airspace.
01:04So I think this is one case, one-time case.
01:08Is there any particular reason why these three countries may be more susceptible to Chinese pressure?
01:12Madagascar just had a military coup.
01:16It is not a very stable country, but, you know, China's presence will help.
01:21But if you want to criticize Seychelles and Mauritius, I think that would be very unnecessary for Taiwan,
01:29especially people who are frustrated by this one, because Mauritius and Seychelles,
01:35if you look at all the international indicators, indexes, you look at the democracy, you look at the governance,
01:44you look at human rights issue, security, human security, and freedom, they are always top two in Africa.
01:54So they are democratic.
01:56They are not, you know, like a leader in the pocket of Beijing when they make the decision.
02:03And that's, I think, the scary part.
02:05It's like you have two small countries.
02:08They are not having the debt trap problem with China.
02:12China's debt to them only represent 10 to 15 percent of their total debt,
02:19much smaller than other financial institutions.
02:22So they are not in the pockets of China for survival or anything.
02:28But they are deciding to do this.
02:31Maybe they are persuaded by China about the one-China policy being strictly enforced.
02:40And I think that's what Taiwan need to pay attention.
02:43China's debt to China.
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