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Jury out on what China law means for Sino-US ties

By John Ruwitch

With the ink on the law barely dry, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice starts a 24-hour visit to Beijing later on Sunday, keen to find out what it really means

THE United States, committed to Taiwan’s defence but wary of being dragged into a war with China, had tried in vain to convince Beijing not to adopt an anti-secession law authorising the use of military force against the island.

With the ink on the law barely dry, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice starts a 24-hour visit to Beijing later on Sunday, keen to find out what it really means and how Beijing will implement it.

She has said that Washington has a responsibility to warn Taiwan and China against unilateral moves that increase tensions, and that the new law doesn’t help. China’s leaders, for their part, may try to persuade her that the law shows Beijing’s deep desire for peaceful reunification.

Despite what is said, analysts say that what the law means for the future of a potential flashpoint and for China-US relations is up in the air.

Chinese analysts are quick to say that the legislation, passed on March 14, does not change China’s policy and could actually benefit Sino-US relations.

“If the United States sees this as something that changes the status quo, then that’s wrong,” said Shen Jiru, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, a state-run think tank.

“Americans have always said they want China’s diplomacy to be more transparent. This law, I think, is an expression of transparency. It clearly states where the bottom lines are ... If there is no misunderstanding on the part of the United States, this should help China-US cooperation.”

The anti-secession law has met with widespread displeasure in Taiwan, and some foreign analysts see it as a reminder of what lies beneath the “kinder and gentler diplomacy” in which China has engaged in recent years. “Underneath the surface there is mounting militarism on the issue of Taiwan,” said Kurt Campbell, director of the CSIS International Security Programme. The Chinese defence budget has logged double-digit growth for years, which Rice has said was a concern.

Job number one for the People’s Liberation Army is acquiring the capability of bringing Taiwan back to the fold. It has some 700 missiles aimed at the island to deter a bid for independence.

The anti-secession law codifies Beijing’s long-standing position on Taiwan, the island where China’s defeated Nationalists fled in 1949 at the end of the civil war. “The effects on cross-Strait relations or on Sino-US relations will depend utterly on how the PRC deploys the law,” said Alan Wachman, associate professor of international politics at Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. China’s official name is the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

“To date, law in China has been regarded as only one tool among many that is used by the authorities to achieve political objectives. When it is convenient to make reference to the law, the state does so,” he said.

In one sense, at least, the law might have been aimed at the United States, which switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979 but is bound by the Taiwan Relations Act to help Taiwan support itself and is its biggest arms supplier.

“The anti-secession law embodies a ‘thumb-in-the-eye’ retort to Washington,” Wachman said.

The law may dampen the voices of those in the United States who consider Taiwan’s independence-leaning president, Chen Shui-bian, as the main threat to stability in the region. “This may be evidence that China’s really the troublemaker and it may relieve a bit of the tension on Chen a bit and focus the problem from the US perspective more on China,” said Bruce Jacobs, a Taiwan watcher at Australia’s Monash University.

In the end, Rice and her Chinese interlocutors may end up talking past each other, in part because their positions are so disparate, and also because key areas in which China and the United States are cooperating may steal the show.

The focus of her trip to Japan, Korea and now China appears to be jumpstarting stalled six-nation talks on the North Korean nuclear crisis. The Bush administration has tried to convince China to use its leverage to get Pyongyang back to the table.

And human rights may figure prominently, too. On Thursday, China released one of its highest-profile political prisoners, ethnic Uighur businesswoman Rebiya Kadeer, who had been atop the list of political detainees raised in talks with US officials. reuters

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