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TAIPEI: Taiwan will not be intimidated by China’s “hooligan” officials and will continue to celebrate its national day around the world, the government said on Tuesday (October 20), after Taiwan said Chinese diplomats had tried to charge into a diplomatic event in Fiji. .
Taiwan’s charges, including that a Taiwanese diplomat ended up in hospital after the altercation, are highly controversial by China, which views the democratically ruled island as its own territory without the right to establish formal ties between states.
LEE: Taiwan says its diplomat was sent to hospital after China spit on Fiji
The Pacific is a major source of competition between the two, where Taiwan has official diplomatic relations with four countries, though not with Fiji.
Taiwan says Chinese diplomats were trying to take pictures of a Taiwan national day event at a hotel to see who was there, and that in the altercation that followed, people on both sides were injured.
Speaking in Taipei, Taiwanese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou said that Taiwan was a “peace-loving country” that invited people to events around the world for its national day on October 10, marking the founding of the ROC, the official name of Taiwan.
“In the future, we will continue to host receptions for the national day,” he said. “This is not going to change”.
China can spread as many lies as it wants, but Taiwan shouldn’t pay too much attention, Ou said.
“The reality is that this year we had 108 offices that held national day events in different ways, inviting the world to celebrate our birthday.”
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Taiwanese Prime Minister Su Tseng-chang said the world needed to see what China was capable of, saying what they did was a “barbaric act.”
“Chinese officials posted abroad are acting like hooligans; hitting people is not acceptable. We severely condemn this,” he told reporters.
The issue was difficult to deal with because Chinese diplomats there have diplomatic immunity, Su added.
“But we must appeal to the international community with the relevant evidence.”
The Fijian Foreign Ministry has yet to comment on the incident, although Ou said the Fijian government had been trying to mediate to close the issue.
