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In its ongoing territorial dispute with Taiwan, China may be looking toward the sky as a new way to thwart the island’s attempts at building diplomatic ties.
This week, China was accused of putting pressure on three African countries — Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar — to withdraw their permission to allow Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te to fly over their territories as he was set to visit Eswatini, the only diplomatic ally Taiwan has in Africa.
“It’s definitely an escalation,” Raymond Kuo, vice-president of research at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, told CBC News. “China has been interested in kind of picking off Taiwan’s diplomatic allies for, well, ever.”
It was also the first instance of a Taiwanese president having to cancel a foreign trip due to a denial of airspace access.
“China is stepping up efforts to stifle Taiwan’s diplomatic outreach by leveraging economic and political influence over smaller nations,” said Eyck Freymann, a Hoover fellow at Stanford University and author of the new book Defending Taiwan: A Strategy to Prevent War with China, in an email to CBC News.
“Its goal is to isolate Taiwan completely on the international stage so that it has no recourse when Beijing moves against it with force or coercion.”
‘Due to strong pressure from China’
Taiwan swiftly condemned the cancellation of the flight permits by Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar. Pan Meng-an, secretary-general to the president, told journalists the actions taken by the African countries were “actually due to strong pressure from the Chinese authorities, including economic coercion.”
He said it “constitutes blatant interference in the internal affairs of other countries, disrupts the regional status quo and hurts the feelings of the Taiwanese people.”
The U.S. State Department also blamed China, saying the three countries acted at the behest of China, in another case of Beijing waging its “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters.
China claims self-ruled Taiwan is a breakaway province, to be retaken by force if necessary, and prohibits countries it has diplomatic relations with from maintaining formal ties with Taipei.
Only 12 countries have formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan.
The Taiwanese government says it has placed its forces on alert as China intensifies its military presence in the Indo-Pacific Ocean and launches air, navy and rocket drills around the island.
China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs didn’t acknowledge or deny putting pressure on the African countries this week, but expressed its “high appreciation” for their actions.
Requires centralized co-ordination
Kuo said it would be surprising if closing the airspace wasn’t a result of Chinese pressure.
“Why would any one of these countries, let alone all three of them, say simultaneously, ‘Yeah, we’re just not going to let this happen,'” he said. “That requires some sort of centralized co-ordination for that to actually happen.”
Drew Thompson, a former U.S. government official responsible for managing relations with China and Taiwan, said this is certainly a new tactic by China. But it’s also pretty consistent with Chinese pressure on Taiwan politically and its attempt to limit Taiwan’s so-called international space, he said.
Thompson, who is also a senior fellow with the Singapore-based S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, said Beijing lobbies countries around the world to prevent Taiwan from participating in international organizations.
He added this recent move by China underscores that the country has significant influence in small African states, where it is a major lender and is providing favourable repayment terms.
If those countries decided to stand up to China, it could just call in those debts and create a fiscal crisis, Thompson said.
“It’s a combination of hard and soft power that China’s applying here on relatively small African states.”
Rana Mitter, S.T. Lee professor of U.S.-Asia relations at the Harvard Kennedy School, pointed out that the he U.S. itself has, at times, avoided offending China over the Taiwan issue.
Last year, as Washington was negotiating a trade deal with China, the U.S. reportedly told Taiwan’s president to cancel his planned stopover in New York while on route to Latin America.
“If the United States is willing to adapt its policy, then it’s not surprising that other countries with smaller economies that are much more dependent on China might also do the same thing,” Mitter said.
Mitter said China’s endgame is to retake Taiwan without using military tactics, by making Taiwan’s position in the world more difficult.
He added recent strategies may also be an attempt by China to sway voters before the Taiwan presidential election in 2028.
Mitter said Taiwan’s current political situation is such that incumbent President Lai Ching-te is being denied aerial access by China’s partners in Africa, while Cheng Li-wun, the chairman of KMT, the main opposition party, was recently invited to mainland China.
He thinks this is all meant to send a bigger signal to Taiwanese voters: that China will make life more difficult unless they choose a leader who is more China-friendly.
“Of course, the flip side of that is that Taiwan’s voters have a history of not liking being told what to do by outside powers,” Mitter said. “So this is a tactic that might not be very productive.”