The European Parliament adopted the report “EU-Taiwan Political Relations and Cooperation” on Oct. 20. The report was adopted with 580 votes in favor, 26 against and 66 abstentions, according to a news release on the European Parliament’s official website, according to Chinese media.
The report says that Taiwan is an important partner and democratic ally of the EU, that bilateral investment agreements are a core element of future EU-Taiwan cooperation, and that the EU must do more to resolve tensions with mainland China and protect Taiwan’s democracy.
The European Parliament called for a strengthening of relations with Taiwan, guided by the EU’s One China Policy, while issuing a warning about the continuing tensions in the Taiwan Strait.
The European Parliament’s resolution sparked widespread outrage in China, with some Chinese netizens suggesting that the Chinese National People’s Congress (NPC) should make a similar resolution on Catalonia in Spain, namely to develop relations with Catalonia to promote its independence under the premise of recognizing “one Spain.”
Other Chinese netizens believe that the European Parliament is acting in a contradictory manner, i.e. it is clearly deceiving and bullying China by ostensibly recognizing that there is only one China, but in fact supporting Taiwan’s independence.
Although Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said at a regular press conference on October 21 that he “strongly condemns and resolutely opposes this”, it was not enough to calm the anger of countless Chinese people.
On the contrary, they see such platitudes as useless and only a sign of weakness on the part of the Chinese government, and they demand that Beijing immediately initiate the reunification of Taiwan by force.
There are also Chinese netizens who ridicule the government for suffering indignities at every turn because of the delay in recovering Taiwan, and they believe the reason for not doing so is only because of the fear of failure, thus threatening its rule.
Many Chinese have long lost patience with the Taiwan issue, but the Chinese government has always been extremely cautious about unifying Taiwan by force, so it is a big challenge for Beijing to calm domestic anger after Western provocations.