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Taiwan: China Threat Justifies Referendum

Posted on: Sunday, 30 November 2003, 06:00 CST

Taiwan's leader on Sunday cited the hundreds of missiles China has aimed at this island as justification for a possible independence referendum.

President Chen Shui-bian's comments were a response to opposition allegations that he was seeking to abuse the law, passed last week, that allows the president to use a "defensive referendum" to respond to a military threat from China.

Chen's announcement Saturday that he wants to hold the vote caused a big stir in Taiwan because China has repeatedly warned that such a move could spark a devastating war. Although the Communists have never ruled Taiwan since coming to power in 1949, they insist the democratic island - 100 miles off the mainland's coast - belongs to Beijing.

China has yet to respond to Chen's comments.

Taiwan's opposition has said the president is only supposed to hold a "defensive referendum" when the island faces an imminent threat. So far, there's no such danger, the opposition says.

But speaking at a campaign rally Sunday, Chen said Taiwan lives under constant threat of attack. He said China has deployed a total of 496 missiles in six bases in the southeastern provinces of Jiangxi, Guangdong and Fujian - just across the Taiwan Strait.

"They deployed the missiles to ready an invasion of Taiwan," Chen said.

The president also argued that a defensive referendum should be pre-emptive by nature; otherwise, it would be of no use, reported the United Daily News, a leading newspaper.

"If we wait for the old Communists to really attack us, then we won't have time, and holding a referendum would be useless," the newspaper quoted the president as saying.

Chen's opponent in the presidential race, Lien Chan of the Nationalist Party, accused Chen of using the referendum to stir up voters and attract attention to his campaign.

"We shouldn't rely on provoking China to gain sympathy and to gain some kind of election benefit," Lien said.

Lien urged all Taiwanese mothers to write Chen to urge him not to send their sons to war. "We don't want him to create a tense situation and put your child and husbands in danger just for the sake of his own power and the campaign," Lien said.

He also said the United States - Taiwan's most important friend - wouldn't help defend the Taiwanese if the island triggered a war with China.

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