Manila is playing with fire on Taiwan question: China Daily editorial

As part of their broader agenda seeking "Taiwan independence", the Democratic Progressive Party authorities of China's Taiwan region have made it a top priority to create the illusion of "sovereignty" for the island. The announcement last week that they plan to establish a "representative office" in Cebu, the second of its kind in the Philippines after the existing "Taipei Economic and Cultural Office" in Manila, is yet another attempt to push the DPP authorities' secessionist agenda under the guise of expanding "economic ties".

Yet, no matter how the DPP authorities collude with external forces in pursuit of so-called "diplomatic breakthroughs" to advance their separatist schemes, such attempts will be in vain and doomed to fail, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said at a recent news briefing. He urged the Philippine side to abide by the one-China principle with concrete actions, and refrain from taking any step that could harm China-Philippines relations.

Manila's collusion with the DPP authorities is driven by domestic political considerations and the instigation of some external forces, which are emboldening it to provoke Beijing regarding the South China Sea issue and the Taiwan question. For example, the initiation of "formal negotiations" between the Philippines and Japan in May to delineate the "maritime boundary" of their so-called "exclusive economic zones" aims to undermine China's sovereignty, which risks turning the waters to the east of China's Taiwan island into a new flashpoint.

Regarding the planned Cebu office, the Philippines' Department of Foreign Affairs issued a statement on Sunday, claiming that the country's one-China policy remains "consistent and unchanged", but it does not stop Manila from pursuing "economic, cultural and functional cooperation" with Taipei. Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr said on Friday that Beijing should not "meddle in" how the Philippines implements that policy.

Such remarks are deliberately misleading. The one-China principle is a political foundation of the Philippines' diplomatic ties with China, which brooks no space for misinterpretation. Establishing the new office under the pretext of "functional cooperation" is a deceptive attempt to hollow out this principle.

According to the 1975 joint communique on the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries, the Philippine government recognizes the government of the People's Republic of China as the sole legal government of China, and fully understands and respects the position of the Chinese government that there is but one China and that Taiwan is an integral part of Chinese territory.

Even if the planned Cebu office is labeled as "nonofficial" or "economic", it provides a platform for covert "Taiwan independence" activities.

As the DPP authorities have openly stated, the planned office is intended to help build a so-called "Taiwan-Philippines Economic Corridor" that would integrate with the Luzon Economic Corridor, which is backed by some external forces as a geopolitical tool in the region. This transforms a supposedly "economic office" into a geopolitical foothold. No wonder some foreign supporters of the Taiwan secessionists directly describe such "economic representative offices" as Taipei's "de facto diplomatic institutions".

The planned opening of the office under the guise of "functional cooperation" is aimed at undermining the one-China principle, using a salami-slicing approach — making small, incremental moves that seem minor but ultimately help change the status quo. Such moves pose a grave challenge to regional stability and risk escalating tensions between China and the Philippines.

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr stated on multiple occasions that the Philippines has no intention of becoming involved in tensions concerning the Taiwan question. But Manila's hypocrisy of saying one thing and doing another on the Taiwan question has been fully exposed in recent months.

By playing with fire on the Taiwan question, Manila risks severely undermining the political trust essential to maintaining stable Sino-Philippine relations.