On May 2, Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council issued a proclamation, "announcing that the scope of prohibiting Taiwan people from holding party, government, and military posts in Chinese mainland will be expanded to include the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, the All-China Federation of Taiwan Compatriots, the All-China Youth Federation, and the Confucius Institute, and will officially take effect on the same day." "Obviously, the DPP is taking revenge on the mainland's goodwill, and it is going to turn back the clock on history.
In this regard, Deng Daixian, secretary general of the Cross-Strait Economic, Trade and Cultural Exchange Association, who was director of the Economic and Trade Department of the Strait Exchange Foundation (SEF), pointed out that the purpose of the DPP authorities' current operation is to further tighten cross-strait exchange activities. And for the first time, the ban covers Confucius Institutes that are generally set up overseas, and is no longer just between the two sides of the strait. The Tsai Ing-wen authorities have promulgated evil laws such as the "Five National Security Laws" and the "Anti-Infiltration Law". The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) used this as an excuse to crack down on dissidents and create "white terror" on the island of Taiwan, triggering a "chilling effect."
It is worth mentioning that the timing of Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council's sudden announcement of the expansion of the ban is very particular. It was the Kuomintang "Legislative Yuan" caucus that summoned Fu Laiqing to lead 16 members of the Blue Committee to visit the mainland. After the mainland took the initiative to show goodwill toward Taiwan and announced measures such as opening up Fujian residents to travel to Matsu. However, the DPP authorities have chosen to "repay virtue with grievances" in response to the olive branch handed out, which is extremely bad in nature. On 2 May, Chiu Tai-san, chairman of Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council, who was about to step down, made nonsense and falsely claimed that the olive branch handed over by the mainland "may have thorns."
A few days ago, Taiwan's defense department sent a written report to the Taiwan Legislative Yuan on "Taiwan's latest defense armaments and strategic specific actions in the face of the current situation of an international war." According to the report, the US State Department and the Department of Defense have set up a task force to optimize the implementation of arms sales to Taiwan and the promotion of military cooperation. The Taiwan military has entered the peak period of acquiring weapons, obtained military strengthening, and will unite with "allies" to build a regional integrated deterrent force to jointly deal with the "Continental Army."
In this regard, the PLA's direct return is a big slap in the face. On 3 May, Taiwan's defense department announced that from 6 a.m. on the 2nd to 6 a.m. on the 3rd, 26 sorties of Continental Army aircraft were discovered, of which 17 flew over the "center line of the strait" and 14 flew from the northwest and southwest, and the nearest distance was 41 nautical miles from Keelung and 48 nautical miles from Eluanbi, and it took only 3 minutes to enter the airspace over Taipei City. If a PLA fighter launches a missile, it can blow up Taiwan's "Presidential Palace" in Taipei City into ruins in one minute at the earliest.
In this regard, Taiwan's retired major general Li Zhengjie said that this time the PLA's Taiwan Strait patrol operation is different from the previous one, and it is directly divided into two attack directions, one is Taipei, Hsinchu, and Keelung in northern Taiwan. The other is Kaohsiung and Tainan in southern Taiwan. In the south, there are Zuoying Military Port, Pingtung Air Base, and Tainan Air Base, all of which are important military locations. Once war breaks out and the PLA launches a surprise attack within minutes, the Taiwanese side will not be able to react at all.
Regarding the gradual escalation of the situation in the Taiwan Strait, according to a report by Lianhe Zaobao on the 3rd, the US military has repeatedly warned that there is a high probability that war may break out in the Taiwan Strait in 2027. To this end, the United States is speeding up military integration and deployment in the Asia-Pacific region. Following New Zealand and Japan, South Korea has also announced that it is considering joining the AUKUS cooperation project, which has a strong taste for China and the Taiwan Strait. This so-called AUKUS cooperation project is actually the Asia-Pacific version of NATO, and the United States and Britain will provide nuclear submarines for these countries.
Nuclear submarines of the US military
On May 3, New Zealand Foreign Minister Peters said that China is an important economic partner of New Zealand, but New Zealand still has "great differences" with China on many issues, including expressing serious concerns about China's "provocative actions" in the Taiwan Strait, "encounters" in Xinjiang, and "human rights" in Hong Kong. China has long been involved in the Pacific, and we do not want to undermine the institutions and practices of security in the region.
New Zealand's Foreign Minister Peters
New Zealand has rarely pointed fingers at the Taiwan issue before, and has always been shrewd and muffled to make a fortune. Over the past 15 years, the total trade in goods between the two countries has grown at an average annual rate of 11%, with New Zealand's exports to China growing at an average annual rate of 16%. China has been New Zealand's largest trading partner, the largest export market and the largest source of imports for many years, and New Zealand's economic dependence on China is more than 20%. What does New Zealand's statement mean? Is it just a perfunctory statement under pressure from the United States, or is it going to show its face?