Taiwan Allies Accuse China of Expansion

UNITED NATIONS - Taiwan's allies accused China on Thursday of expanding its arsenal of missiles aimed at Taiwan in readiness for an invasion and urged the United Nations to step in and promote a peaceful dialogue between the two parties.

China retorted that the Taiwan issue is an internal matter - not one for the United Nations to address.

Taiwan's former Nationalist government was a founding member of the United Nations in 1945 when it was based in China. But the Communist Party's capture of the mainland in 1949 and the Nationalists' retreat to Taiwan led to the communist government's takeover of China's U.N. seat in 1971.

Since 1993, Taiwan's supporters have been trying to get the General Assembly to list the issue of its admission on the U.N. agenda but Beijing's argument that Taiwan is part of China has prevailed - and it is certain to prevail again when the issue comes before the new session of the General Assembly next week.

In recent years, China has used its increasing political clout and economic power to lure away Taiwan's allies, mostly small countries in the Pacific, Africa and Latin America. Only 24 nations continue to recognize Taiwan.

But in a preemptive move, several Taiwan supporters including Gambia and Tuvalu raised the issue of China's military build-up during a General Assembly debate on a report by Secretary-General Kofi Annan on "Prevention of Armed Conflict."

Gambia's U.N. Ambassador Crispin Grey-Johnson said his government believes the United Nations has the responsibility to intervene to prevent the eruption of conflicts "regardless of whether they are within or between states."

He cited "a very serious omission" in Annan's report - "the deteriorating security situation across the Taiwan Strait."

"It is unfortunate that none other than the People's Republic of China, a respected member of the Security Council, the custodian of international peace and security, is itself engaged in threats to international peace and security by expanding its already huge military arsenal in readiness for an invasion of Taiwan," Grey-Johnson said.

"Every year for the past several years, China has trained about 100 additional missiles on Taiwan, reaching a total of 800 missiles this year," he said. "And China has openly stated that it is prepared to settle the Taiwan question through `non-peaceful means and other necessary measures.'"

Tuvalu's U.N. Ambassador Enele Somoaga noted the council's swift action on North Korea's recent ballistic missile tests, and its nuclear program, and urged council members to deal similarly with "the threat of the use of military force in the Taiwan Strait."

"The irony of the situation is the fact that there is no effective political mechanism to resolving this particular dispute, as we all know the 23 million people of Taiwan are not represented in this body, despite their contributions to international cooperation," he said.

"Surely the U.N. cannot fail its collective responsibily to work peace by ignoring this threat," Somoaga said.

Chinese diplomat Liu Pei expressed regret that a small number of countries raised the Taiwan issue.

"I wonder if it did this at the instigation of others or out of other designs," he said.

"The Chinese delegation wishes to reiterate that there is but one China in the world and that Taiwan is an inseparable part of the People's Republic of China," Liu said. "I wish to emphasize that the Taiwan question is entirely an internal affair of China and bears no relation whatsoever to the prevention of armed conflict."