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Tag: One China Policy

  • Donald Low: Singaporeans Need To Get Facts Right On Singapore’s Role In China’s Economic Modernisation

    Donald Low: Singaporeans Need To Get Facts Right On Singapore’s Role In China’s Economic Modernisation

    The Singaporeans who think that the current kerfuffle with China shows that the Chinese government has forgotten that it was Singapore that inspired China’s economic modernization (beginning with Deng Xiaoping’s visit to Singapore in 1978) really need to get their heads (and their understanding of economic history) checked.

    First, the Chinese do not forget easily.

    Second, it is simply not true that Singapore’s development story was of great relevance for China. China’s development experience of the last thirty years has a lot more in common with Japan, South Korea and Taiwan’s experience: export-led industrialization through home-grown firms rather than MNCs, industrial policy aimed at developing indigenous capabilities rather than simply importing technologies from abroad, maintenance of tariff barriers (rather than the free trade that Singapore practised) for relatively long periods to benefit local companies, financial repression rather than a liberalized capital account, relatively weak rule of law, government-business relations that are quite cosy and corrupt, etc. All these practices are more reminiscent of China’s northeast Asian neighbors than of Singapore. So it’s simply not true that our development experience was an important role model for China; it’s delusional for us to think we are—then, or now.

    To the extent that the Chinese were interested in the Singapore experience at all, it has more to do with how the state maintained law and order, political stability and one party rule in an ostensibly democratic environment.

     

    Source: Donald Low

  • PRC Government Tabloid: Punish Singapore – Melt Down Confiscated Terrexes

    PRC Government Tabloid: Punish Singapore – Melt Down Confiscated Terrexes

    China’s state run tabloid The Global Times wrote on Tuesday (29 November 2016) that the 9 Singaporean troop carriers which had been confiscated by China should be melted down at the steel mills to express their displeasure with Singapore over its military relationship with Taiwan.

    The Global Times wrote a scathing report blasting Singapore for its careless handling of its armoured vehicles and said that this implied Singapore’s failure to take China’s displeasure over the long standing Taiwan relationship seriously.

    It claimed that Singapore’s image among the ordinary Chinese people was so rotten that it was best that the PRC Govt sent the armoured carriers to the steel mills to be melted down as punishment for Singapore.

    Global Times added that Singapore should reflect on its hypocrisy and seek enlightenment in its relations with China.

    Source: www.allsingaporestuff.com

  • Vivian Balakrishnan: Singapore-Taiwan Arrangement Longstanding, Does Not Affect Singapore’s Adherence To ‘One-China’ Policy

    Vivian Balakrishnan: Singapore-Taiwan Arrangement Longstanding, Does Not Affect Singapore’s Adherence To ‘One-China’ Policy

    Singapore will not allow any single issue to hijack its longstanding, multifaceted relationship with China, Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan said yesterday.

    He also said that Singapore’s training arrangements with Taiwan are long-running and not a secret, and that a large number of Singaporean men have trained there since 1975.

    “Everyone, including China, knows that we’ve had special arrangements with Taiwan for a long time and what we are doing there is no longer a secret,” Dr Balakrishnan said at The Straits Times Global Outlook Forum when asked about the seizure of Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) armoured vehicles at a Hong Kong port last Wednesday.

    He added that he had told his Chinese counterpart that Singapore values its longstanding relationships.

    The nine Terrex vehicles and equipment that were seized had been used in an SAF military exercise in Taiwan and were on an APL ship taking them back to Singapore.

    The ship was in transit in Hong Kong. Following the seizure, China asked Singapore on Monday to adhere to the “one China” policy.

    Separately, Defence Minister Ng Eng Hen said yesterday that “Singapore fully respects and supports the ‘one China’ policy… We play a positive role in cross-strait relations, and we will continue to do so”.

    Speaking at a visit to a military camp, Dr Ng said officials from shipping line APL met Hong Kong Customs officials yesterday.

    Mindef officials will monitor the meeting closely, he said. He hoped it will clarify the reasons and legal basis for the detention. Mindef will decide on the appropriate course of action based on its outcome.

    Asked if the incident would affect Singapore’s training arrangements overseas, Dr Ng said the SAF will continue to train abroad based on bilateral agreements.

    “We adhere to the ‘one China’ policy. Any training matters between us and other countries are bilateral, and we should not unnecessarily, until the facts come out, muddle the picture and impute various motives.”

     

    Source: www.straitstimes.com

  • Ambassador-At-Large Bilahari Kausikan: Singapore Cannot Be Intimidated By China’s Posturing

    Ambassador-At-Large Bilahari Kausikan: Singapore Cannot Be Intimidated By China’s Posturing

    Nine of Singapore’s armored personnel carriers (APCs) were quietly making its way from Taiwan to Singapore. For some strange reasons, the ship they were on stopped at Hong Kong. That’s when things got really interesting really fast.

    Our nine APCs were impounded by Hong Kong.

    That sparked off much discussion online about China-Singapore relationship. Is this move because China is super buay song with Singapore?

    And what better way to understand what’s happening here than from picking the brains of resident grass-cutter  ambassador-at-large and former permanent secretary of Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), Bilahari Kausikan?

    Just in case you’re not following him on Facebook, or if you’ve missed reading his comments here, we’ve lifted some of the more ‘colourful’ ones here.

    Someone said that this move is because China is showing its displeasure at Singapore for holding military exercises in Taiwan. To that, Ambassador Bilahari said:

    “Open displeasure is meant to intimidate Singaporeans because they have realised that with or without LKY the government cannot be intimidated. They are trying to intimidate Singaporeans in order to get Singaporeans to pressure the government.”

    Another person said this incident is because China is unhappy with Singapore speaking up on the South China Sea issue. She wondered if China would leave us alone if we had kept quiet. Ambassador Bilahari disagreed:

    “Of course not. If we had stayed quiet on an issue of such importance they would have asked for more: that we speak out in support of their position and play the role Cambodia plays for them in ASEAN (even Laos is not as bad). They know we are far more credible than Cambodia internationally and thus want us to be their mouthpiece. Of course, we do on occasion support them when it is in our interests, for example on Hong Kong and the Western Regions project at Chongqing that we undertook at Xi Jinping’s request. But we cannot be just their mouthpiece which is fundamentally what they want and what they mean when they refer to us, despite our constant denials, as a ‘Chinese country’. If we do that our credibility with the US, Japan, India, Australia among others would be entirely destroyed and we have important interests with these countries too.”

    Ambassador Bilahari went on to explain that it is important that the way we interact with China is consistent with the way we interact with any other countries:

    “Our government is not rash but the considerations are not just relations with China. If we allow ourselves to be intimidated by Beijing what do you think our immediate neighbours will think?”

    But surely it’s not easy to remain so principled when dealing with such a huge power. Especially since we are such a small country. To do that, we would need a certain “bad-boy” streak. Or as Ambassador Bilahari put it:

    “I am well known among the pandas as very KL or whatever the equivalent is in Mandarin!”

    And:

    “No skill involved just indifference to death.”

    This incident reminds us that we cannot take our relationships with other nations for granted. Thankfully, it seems that there are enough people who have this “indifference to death” working to advance Singapore’s interests abroad.

     

    Source: www.unscrambled.sg