By Chen Yun and Jason Pan / Staff reporters
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) officials denied comments by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) that Vice President William Lai (賴清德), the party’s presidential candidate, is a “troublemaker” seeking to manipulate voters.
The TAO also condemned Lai picking former representative to the US Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) as his running mate, denouncing the Lai-Hsiao ticket as “a doubling up of Taiwanese independence advocates,” the DPP said.
It is regrettable for China to denigrate the “Lai-Hsiao” ticket for January’s presidential election, DPP spokesman Chang Chih-hao (張志豪) said yesterday.
Photo courtesy of William Lai’s campaign office
“President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) and party Chairman William Lai have repeatedly stressed that the Taiwanese government does not seek to provoke [China], nor take unilateral actions to change the status of cross-strait relations,” Chang said. “Taiwan’s insistence on peace and stability is endorsed by the international community.”
TAO spokesman Chen Binhua (陳斌華) on Tuesday called Lai a “troublemaker” and advocate for Taiwanese independence, who is distorting China’s position on Taiwan to deceive voters, specifically by criticizing the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) for framing the elections as “a choice between peace and war.”
Chen said that by claiming that China has no plan in the coming years to attack Taiwan, Lai was “trying to downplay his role as a Taiwanese independence advocate,” which could lead to war.
“Chinese government officials have never gone through the democratic voting process, so we have no need to respond to them,” Lai said yesterday. “China has continued to cast aspersions on our democratic election, which is clear evidence of their direct interference into Taiwan’s presidential and legislative elections.”
“The biggest threat to peace and stability in the region comes from China’s military expansionism, and its disdain for countries that have a free and democratic system,” Chang said, adding that the DPP is determined to safeguard peace and the nation’s democracy and economic prosperity.
He said that Beijing openly tried to influence Taiwan’s elections by mandating that Taiwanese businesspeople in China release a joint statement in support of a “blue-white alliance” between the KMT and the Taiwan People’s Party.
It also tried to interfere by initiating tax investigations into the Chinese operations of Hon Hai Precision Industry Co, founded by independent presidential candidate Terry Gou (郭台銘), and attacking the Lai-Hsiao ticket, while repeating the same rhetoric that the election is a choice between war and peace, he said.
China is creating an atmosphere of fear to influence the elections, while encouraging a blue-white coalition to meddle in Taiwan’s elections, he added.
Tsai and Lai have reiterated numerous times that Taipei is open to friendly cross-strait relations, but would not surrender under the threat of force, Chang said.
“We will not go back to the old ways of military confrontation, but instead take a pragmatic approach in dealing with China, while seeking to safeguard peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait,” he said.
“Taiwanese have taken for granted their rights to a free society and democratic system to be as normal as breathing air. However, China considers it a provocation, as it reveals the authoritarian control of the Chinese Communist Party,” he said.
“They are the ones in conflict with the world, going against liberal democratic countries,” he added.
Taiwan faces more military intimidation from China, which is using covert tactics to subvert the nation’s democratic system, Chang said.
“However, the DPP will stand firm to safeguard Taiwan’s sovereignty, and we shall never capitulate, and will not go back to the old days of the ‘one China’ policy,” he said.
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