SUNS 4502 Friday 3 September 1999

United Nations: No place at the table for Taiwan

United Nations, Aug 31 (IPS/Thalif Deen) -- The United Nations will welcome three new member states next month but again Taiwan will not be one of them, despite its persistent attempts to seek re-admission to the world body.

The 54th session of the UN General Assembly will start in mid- September by admitting Nauru, Tonga and Kiribati as UN members - bringing total membership to 188 countries.

All three South Pacific nation states - populated by about 190,000 people - Tonga with a population of 98,000, Kiribati with 81,000 and Nauru with 11,000 were recently approved for membership by the General Assembly and the 15-member Security Council.

But Taiwan (which in UN terminology is called 'Taiwan province of China') which has been knocking longest on the UN's door continues to be barred from the organisation. Since it was expelled from the United Nations in October 1971 and replaced by the communist regime on the mainland, Taiwan has made several unsuccessful attempts to seek re-admission to the world body.

The overwhelming majority of UN member states - who have strong diplomatic ties to Beijing - subscribe to the Chinese view that Taiwan is not a sovereign nation state and is only a province of China.

Still, the Taiwanese government will make yet another attempt in September to re-gain admission to the United nations, supported perhaps by the only 12 countries maintaining political and diplomatic relations with Tapei - Burkina Faso, El Salvador, Gambia, Grenada, Honduras, Liberia, Marshall Islands, Nicaragua,
Saint Vincent-Grenadines, Senegal, Solomon Islands and Swaziland.

It is a foregone conclusion, however, that the proposed resolution "to ensure the fundamental rights" of the 22 million people in Taiwan "to participate in the work and activities of the United Nations" will be rejected by the UN's Credentials Committee, before it even reaches the floor of the General Assembly or the Security Council.

In the unlikely event that it passes muster in the General Assembly, China will use its veto in the Security Council to block Taiwan's re-admission to the world body. The United States, which also has veto powers in the Council, has made it clear it too does not support UN membership for Taiwan.

During his tour of China in July last year, US President Bill Clinton said: "We don't support independence for Taiwan; or two Chinas; or one Taiwan/one China; and we don't believe that Taiwan should be a member in any organisation for which statehood is a requirement."

In contrast to the 16 countries backing Taiwan, China has diplomatic relations with more than 160 of the current 185 member states in the Organisation.
"They all acknowledge that there is only one China in the world, that the government of the People's Republic of China is the sole legal government representing the whole of China and that Taiwan is a part of China," says Ambassador Qin Huasun of China.

"The issue of Taiwan is purely an internal matter of China and an issue for the Chinese themselves to resolve," Qin says."It brooks no foreign interference. There is nobody in the world who cares more about the future and interests of the 22 million Taiwan compatriots than the Chinese government and people."

China's fundamental state policy was expounded by the late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping who called for a "peaceful reunification" of China and Taiwan under the concept of "one country, two systems."

The Chinese envoy says that the United Nations is an inter- governmental international organisation composed of sovereign states - and there is no place for Taiwan now, or in the future.

"The proposal by Nicaragua and a handful of other countries would only fan the flames of Taiwan's separatist activities and hinder China's peaceful reunification," Qin says.

The sponsors of the resolution say that the exclusion of Taiwan "is anachronistic, unjust and potentially injurious to international peace and security." Taiwan, they say, is "a free and democratic country." "The United Nations should consider with an open mind the appeal of its 22 million people for their own
representation in the UN."

In the eyes of the United Nations and the World Bank, however, Taiwan has ceased to exist - except as "a province of China," and in their publications Taiwan is listed as a part of China - the same as Hong Kong and Macau.

Last year, the United States and China were embroiled in a political dispute over the inclusion of Taiwan in the UN Arms Register established in 1992 as an annual exercise in military transparency.

The Chinese government is so sensitive to the issue that it pulled out of the Register under protest and vowed never to return - unless the US keeps Taiwan out of the arms buyers list that it submits each year to the United Nations.

The Register is expected only to record arms transfers "between sovereign nation states," notes a Chinese official adding that Taiwan has no place on the Register "because it is only a province of China."
The inclusion of Taiwan not only is "a violation of China's sovereignty but also interference in the internal affairs of a member state."