‘If the world fails to act, this will continue’: Taiwan’s urgent warning on China’s ‘expansionism’

TAIPEI, July 8 — China’s “authoritarian expansionism” in regional waters will persist if the world fails to act, a senior Taiwanese security official warned on Wednesday, describing Beijing’s strategy as “incremental salami slicing”.

Chinese ships regularly ply the East China Sea, Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea to assert Beijing’s maritime claims over disputed waters and islands.

China is “constantly pushing the limits through an incremental salami-slicing approach,” Lii Wen, a deputy secretary-general of the National Security Council, told an international forum.

Lii said China’s “authoritarian expansionism” involved the use of military, coast guard, research and maritime militia vessels to press its claims and attempt to “transform international waterways into internal waters”.

“If the world fails to voice our concerns or take action, this expansionism will only continue,” Lii warned.

Ocean Affairs Minister Kuan Bi-ling told the forum that Taiwan, Japan and the Philippines faced the “same pattern of actions” that were “deliberately controlled to remain below the threshold of conventional warfare”.

“When a series of actions accumulates, it may create an entirely new status quo,” Kuan said.

Kuan said international partners needed to have “shared understanding of the status quo” and prepare coordinated response measures “before the next crisis occurs”.

Their remarks came a day after ships from Japan’s and China’s coast guards faced off near disputed islands claimed as the Senkaku in Japan and the Diaoyu in China.

Each side claimed they drove out the other’s vessels that had intruded into their territorial waters.

Last month, China started patrolling waters to the east of Taiwan for the first time following talks between Japan and the Philippines to draw a boundary in that area, which Beijing called “illegal”.

China claims Taiwan is part of its territory and also asserts that waters around the island democracy come under its jurisdiction, which Taipei rejects.

Ocean Affairs Deputy Minister Sung Chen-en said he would ensure China’s patrol was not “permanent”, noting the affected waters were “within our exclusive economic zone”.

“They don’t have rights here, no matter what are their excuses,” Sung told AFP on the sidelines of the forum.

At the forum, US Democratic Senator Tammy Duckworth said the international community needed to keep transiting waters claimed by China and “overtly reject attempts by the Communist Party to force us to adhere to their norms and the new rules that they want to set up.” — AFP