Chinese President Hu Jintao yesterday told President Bush that the next two years will be a time of “high danger” for Taiwan, as the island republic prepares again to apply for a seat in the United Nations.
The U.S. and Chinese presidents made an unusual joint appeal against a planned Taiwanese referendum on the U.N. bid after a bilateral talk on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific regional summit here. Beijing considers Taiwan part of its territory, and Washington has long urged both sides to avoid moves that would upset the present diplomatic stalemate.
“This year and next year are a period of high danger for the Taiwan situation,” Mr. Hu told Mr. Bush in bilateral talks, according to a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman.
“We must give stronger warnings to the Taiwan authorities,” Liu Jianchao quoted the Chinese president as saying. “We cannot allow anyone to use any means to split Taiwan from the motherland.”
James Jeffrey, Mr. Bush’s deputy national security adviser, told reporters the United States is also “concerned very much about this step that Taiwan has undertaken.”
“We also don’t want to see this blown up too big. We don’t want to see anyone provoked by the actions of the Taiwanese, so for the moment we’re going to stay with our position and continue to exert our good influence on the Taiwanese to see if we can change their position,” Mr. Jeffrey said.
But a defiant Chen Shui-bian, president of the Republic of China (Taiwan), told a Washington gathering yesterday that his country has played the “very obedient child” to Washington for too long and would press ahead despite the clear opposition of the Bush administration.
Mr. Chen’s proposed referendum is considered especially provocative because it would seek U.N. membership as “Taiwan,” dropping the traditional Republic of China name.
“We have to alter our strategy and not sell ourselves short anymore,” said Mr. Chen, speaking to an American Enterprise Institute forum via videoconference from Taipei. “We have no need for anyone to tell us whether Taiwan is a country or not.”
The planned March referendum, which would coincide with Taiwan’s presidential elections, “is not my personal agenda,” said Mr. Chen, speaking in Mandarin Chinese through an interpreter.
“This is the agenda of the majority of our 23 million people. My duty as a leader is to reflect the people’s voice.”
On another issue, Mr. Hu yesterday defended the safety and quality of his country’s exports and offered to work with other countries to improve any shortfalls in the country’s inspection regimes.
“The Chinese government has always taken the quality of Chinese products and the safety of Chinese food very seriously,” Mr. Hu said at a press conference with Australian Prime Minister John Howard on a visit to Australia’s business capital.
For the past six months, China has experienced a spate of product recalls and bans on chemical-laden foods, sparking international concern about the safety of Chinese goods. Tainted pet food ingredients killed dogs in the United States, but Beijing took only cursory steps to deal with the problem before accusing the West of exaggerating the issue.
Mr. Bush raised the product-safety issue with Mr. Hu, who said China is prepared to “step up cooperation in quality inspections and examinations.”
Mr. Bush and Mr. Hu also discussed climate change, which has emerged as a key issue here at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit. Mr. Hu opposes a plan by host Australia — backed by the United States — for a tough statement that would commit emerging nations like China to reducing greenhouse-gas emissions.
Mr. Hu said China supported moves to tackle climate change but insisted the “main channel” for any international agreement should be the United Nations.
Mr. Bush has been criticized by environmentalists and others for his opposition to the 1997 Kyoto treaty to deal with global warming, and China has faced criticism for the huge amounts of greenhouse gases its power plants and industries pump into the atmosphere. The fact that neither China nor India, another major global polluter, was covered under Kyoto was one reason Mr. Bush has opposed the pact.
Mr. Bush is scheduled to have lunch today with Southeast Asian leaders and meet with South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun and Russian President Vladimir Putin. In a morning speech yesterday, he issued an appeal to Asia-Pacific business leaders for their help in getting stalled global trade talks restarted.
The six-year-old trade talks known as the Doha Round have stalled in recent months, largely because of wrangling between rich and poor countries over eliminating barriers to agricultural goods and, more recently, manufacturing trade.
• Joseph Curl reported from Sydney, Australia and David R. Sands reported from Washington.
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