WJPBR Email News List [EMAIL PROTECTED] Peace at any cost is a Prelude to War! China Flexes Muscles South of U.S. Borders NewsMax.com Monday, Aug. 14, 2000 China has demonstrated its growing influence in Central America by throwing road blocks in the way of the Taiwanese president's planned diplomatic visit to the area. While the dominant Chinese presence in Panama since the U.S. pullout is widely recognized, mainland China’s increasing power in the rest of Central America has up until now been less obvious. It became very apparent last week when pressure from Beijing caused three Central American governments to tell Taiwan’s President Chen Shui-bian he wasn’t welcome in their countries during his planned tour of the area. Moreover, Nicaragua, the one Central American nation that told Chen to come ahead, is accused of demanding $100 million in exchange for putting out the welcome mat for Chen and promising to continue to recognize Taiwan diplomatically. "It's just a disaster,'' one knowledgeable Taiwanese source told the Miami Herald. "We give so much money to these countries, and they just keep playing the mainland off against us in order to get more.'' According to the Herald, Chen is due to begin his now partially aborted tour of Central America after a visit to the Dominican Republic. He then will move on to Nicaragua and Costa Rica before going to Africa, where he will travel through Gambia, Chad and Burkino Faso. What is shocking about the snubs to the Taiwanese president is the fact that all seven Central American nations including Panama recognize Taiwan and not the Beijing regime as the legitimate government of China. Yet El Salvador (which welcomed a recent tour of the nation by China’s ambassador to Mexico), Guatemala and Panama all nixed Chen’s visit to their homelands. Taiwan officials were stunned by the rejection of their president’s visits, given the fact that Taipei has been a major source of funds to the cash-strapped Central American nations. Panama, for example, recently got a $30 million low-interest loan plus an informal promise of what diplomats from both countries describe to the Herald as tens of millions of dollars in additional aid and investment. Yet Panama’s President Mireya Moscoso coldly rejected Chen’s bid for a diplomatic visit. "It's a shame – you give them $30 million and then you can't even get into the country,'' one Taiwan source told the Herald. "If after spending so much money, the president can't even come here, what's the point?" Diplomatic experts say that Moscoso’s snub of Chen further demonstrates the power of Mainland China in Panama, where a firm closely tied to the Chinese military now dominates both ends of the Panama Canal. The $100 million price tag Nicaragua allegedly put on continued diplomatic recognition for a Chen visit was angrily denounced by Taiwan's foreign minister, Tien Hung-mao, who said that the demand for the money was "inappropriate'' and "damaging to bilateral relations.'' Nicaragua's foreign minister, Eduardo Montealegre, denied making such a demand, telling the Herald: "Our relationship with Taiwan is important, and we would not jeopardize it by doing something like that, And it's not a relationship based on money. Our relations with them began in 1949, when they were as poor as we were. We've been with them through bad times as well as good.'' Taiwan has doled out more than $1 billion in aid to Nicaragua over the past 10 years; the $123 million in Taiwanese donations to Nicaragua over the past three years are larger than those from any other country except Japan and the United States. And the rest of Central America has been on the receiving end of similar Taiwanese generosity. And Taiwan expects to get something in return for the billions of dollars it has poured into the region. Taiwanese diplomats told the Herald that the least they expect is continued diplomatic recognition, support for Taiwan’s readmission to the United Nations, and the opportunity for state visits such as Chen’s that show that at least some governments see Taiwan as a full-fledged nation rather than the breakaway Chinese province Beijing insists it is. *COPYRIGHT NOTICE** In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for nonprofit research and educational purposes only.[Ref. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ] Want to be on our lists? 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