Taiwan says it is witnessing 'less Chinese interference' ahead of elections

Taipei: Taiwanese Foreign Minister Joseph Wu on Wednesday said that the island nation is seeing less Chinese interference ahead of its local elections, probably due to China’s own domestic issues and its efforts to improve its image on a global level.

While speaking to reporters ahead of Saturday’s elections in Taiwan for mayors and councillors, Joseph Wu said that China was always a factor when his nation voted, however, this time around Beijing was meddling less. He said, “I would describe it as that the Chinese interference in our election is not as prevailing as previous elections.”

Wu added that the elements not there this time included using “cheap air tickets” to encourage Taiwanese who live in China to go home to vote for pro-China candidates or ‘intimidating Taiwan’s citizens’. Notably, China’s Taiwan Affairs Office has accused Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party of hyping up the threat from China for its own political gain.

The Taiwanese Foreign Minister said that he didn’t definitely know why China was being more hands-off with this election, however, it could be because Beijing was trying to get its ties with other countries back on track after being criticised for threats against Taiwan.

It is pertinent to mention here that Taiwan has accused China which claims the democratically governed island as its own territory, of repeated efforts to sway the election results by either online disinformation campaigns or overt military threats.

Wu also said that it is also possible that Beijing is very busy dealing with its own domestic problems while referring to issues like COVID-19 lockdowns and property market problems. He further added that the elections were important for China as well as Taiwan was a model for democracy in the Chinese-speaking world.

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