Perth Voice Interactive

The Independent and Peaceful Australia Network held its 2024 conference in Perth from October 4 – 6 with a strong emphasis on the AUKUS nuclear submarine deal and the stationing of nuclear submarines at Garden Island. JOHN LANDER is a former Australian diplomat who was based in China; he prefaced his speech at the conference by saying he believes Australia is being groomed to be the United States’ aggressive proxy while it dodges a direct showdown with China.

THE issue which the United States uses to provoke a war between China and the American proxies in the AsiaPacific region, is the status of Taiwan. 

There is lot of disinformation and confusion about this. So, I’ve been asked to lay out Australia’s legal position regarding Taiwan.

Australia’s One China Principle recognises Taiwan as part of China. 

It pre-dates, by several decades, Australia’s recognition in 1972 of the Peoples’ Republic of China (PRC) as the sole legitimate government of the whole of China.  

Before, during and after the Second World War, Australia maintained diplomatic relations with the Republic of China (ROC) on the basis that Taiwan was part of China, even when it was under military occupation by Japan.  

At the end of WWII, Japan’s Instrument of Surrender legally restored Taiwan to China, then nominally the Republic of China. 

We continued recognition and diplomatic relations with the Republic of China, as the whole of China, including Taiwan, until 1972.

The establishment of the Peoples’ Republic of China in 1949 amounted to a change of governance and a change of government, but did not constitute a change to China’s sovereign territory – a point on which both the Communist Party of China and the Nationalists agreed.

During the negotiations for recognition of the PRC, we tried to persuade the government of the PRC to accept a formulation that would afford Taiwan some degree of status as a separate international entity. 

Not budge

They would not budge (interestingly the representatives of the ROC in Canberra also opposed it, because they still hoped to persuade Australia to continue to recognise the ROC as the legitimate government of the whole of China).

The Joint Communique of 1972 acknowledged (i.e. recognised and accepted) that Taiwan is integral to China. 

Accordingly, we ceased to recognise the ROC and severed diplomatic relations with it, on the understanding that unofficial exchanges could continue.

So, the Joint Communique did not create Australia’s One China Principle. 

It re-affirmed a principle under which Australia had conducted its dealings with China since well before the end of WWII.

Assertions by the United States that it adheres to the One China Principle and does not intend to go to war against China offer cold comfort. 

It continues to arm Taiwan – and the network of proxies – from Japan through South Korea and the Philippines down to Australia – for war against China. 

Efforts by the agents for US political and strategic policy within the Australian parliament and government and abroad, to goad China into war over Taiwan, continue unabated.  

A recent example is the [Australian] Senate motion that deliberately misrepresented the United Nations’ resolution that recognised the Peoples’ Republic of China in the General Assembly and Security Council.  

The UN Resolution did not mention the Republic of China nor Taiwan by name, specifically to avoid any implication that Taiwan had status as a separate international entity.

Parliamentary visits also run counter to Australia’s undertaking not to engage in official dealings with Taiwan.

Since Taiwan is integral to China, so-called ‘freedom of navigation’ by military vessels through the Taiwan Strait, is a violation of China’s sovereign territory and the Law of the Sea, which it purports to uphold.

It also undermines Australia’s One China Principle. 

Remarkably China has so far taken no action against such intrusions.

While Taiwan is part of China, it does not operate under the same system of governance, nor under the same government. 

The PRC has long committed to the peaceful social, economic and eventually political reintegration of the people of Taiwan into the life of the nation. 

It has, however, reserved the right to use force, as a last resort, to prevent the separation of Taiwan from the sovereign territory of China.

If we encourage elements in Taiwan to declare independence, we simply bring the prospect of war closer.  

The notion that China poses a military threat to mainland United States is ludicrous.

China’s military budget is one third that of the United States and, unlike the United States, China does not have 800 military bases around the world and has not anchored the majority of its naval power off the coast of the United States.  

Likewise, China does not pose a military threat to Australia.

The so-called ‘unprecedented military build-up’ by China is clearly to protect against the massive military threat it faces from the United States and its allies (Including Australia).  

Australia is now committed to spending $3.5 million per day for the next thirty years to acquire an offensive capability against the fictitious “China threat” – a capability which might never materialise, since the US and the UK have reserved the right to withhold delivery, if it would deplete their own requirement. (and we won’t get our money back!).