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To Resist or Engage Old Foe China: Focus of Taiwan's Presidential Race

Ralph Jennings

   TAIPEI - The Taiwan ruling party's expected nomination this week of
   Beijing-wary incumbent President Tsai Ing-wen for a second term in
   office will kick off a campaign season highlighted by the island's
   sticky, increasingly strained ties with China.

   Tsai won't talk to officials in Beijing unless the Communist government
   drops its demand that she identifies Taiwan as part of a single China.
   The 62-year-old law scholar first elected in 2016 is expected to run
   with the Democratic Progressive Party against an opposition Nationalist
   Party candidate who favors more engagement with Beijing. Their views
   would shape a campaign that will last until Taiwanese go to the polls
   in January.

   China has claimed sovereignty over Taiwan since the Chinese civil war
   of the 1940s, when the Nationalists lost to the Communists and re-based
   their government on the nearby island. China insists that the two sides
   eventually unify. Taiwan democratized in the 1980s and in January a
   government poll found that about 80% of Taiwanese oppose unification
   with Beijing.

   "Taiwan's people will become more opposed to China, more opposed to the
   Communist Party government, so they will end up being more opposed to
   candidates from the Nationalist Party," said Michael Tsai, chairman of
   the Institute for Taiwan Defense and Strategic Studies in Taiwan. "Will
   ballots be cast for the Democratic Progressive Party then? I think
   there's got to be some effect."

   But many voters also want strong economic ties with China. Tsai's party
   takes a guarded stance toward China and has never sat down for talks,
   while the Nationalists have a record of dialogue with China on trade
   and investment ties.

   Leading campaign issue

   China has always been a focus of politics in Taiwan, but this year the
   topic took on extra weight because of a landmark pro-unification speech
   by Chinese President Xi Jinping aimed at Taiwan, and mass street
   protests in Hong Kong against elements of growing Chinese control over
   the former British colony that's sometimes watched as a bellwether for
   what would happen if China took over Taiwan.

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