According to a report by Donald Turvill, Local Democracy Reporter for EdinburghLive on August 27, 2024, the City of Edinburgh has decided to withdraw from a proposed formal friendship agreement with Taiwan, following pressure from the Chinese government.
This decision comes after the council leader, Cammy Day, expressed disappointment regarding the response from various local institutions, which raised concerns about potential repercussions on trade and relations with China.
Last year, Edinburgh’s council leader accepted a set of books to signify the strengthening of cultural, economic, and historic links with Taiwan. However, the planned friendship agreement was hastily removed from the council’s agenda in June after warnings from institutions like the University of Edinburgh and Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce that such a move could lead to sanctions and reduced trade.
China’s representative in Edinburgh spoke previously of “grave concerns” about the agreement.
In a letter sent earlier in the year and reported by the BBC, Consul General Zhang Biao wrote:
“This is not an action simply to promote exchange and friendship; it is deeply related to the Taiwan question and will bring about serious consequences. T
The Chinese government firmly opposes counties that have diplomatic ties with China to conduct official exchanges with Taiwan in any form, including signing agreement with sovereign implications or of an official nature.”
He added that the agreement with Taiwan “will hurt the feeling of the Chinese people and bring about serious consequences to our bilateral relations, which we do not want to see. Surely Edinburgh would benefit little but lose a lot from such action.”
As a result, the council opted for a less formal approach, with the Lord Provost now set to communicate intentions to maintain collaboration with the Taiwanese city of Kaohsiung without a formal agreement.
Cllr Day said, “I regret we’re not in a position to support an MOU yet,” while highlighting the need for Edinburgh to have international arrangements, including with Taiwan. He noted that while the formal agreement was shelved, efforts to sustain relationships through cultural and educational activities would continue.
Shameful. Also, the Olympic ambassadors or security removed signs from audience members for simply showing an A4 piece of paper to show Taiwan on it. See the China Show on YouTube episode 223.
A shame. How many Chinese students are there at Edinburgh university?
Well, Chinese students got a lecturer, Michelle Shipworth, fired from a London university for talking about Tiananmen Square. Also, remember that Glasgow also had one of those overseas police stations that aid the Chinese Embassy.
Correction: Michelle Shipworth was banned from teaching a “provocative” course involving Tiananmen Square/China to protect UCL’s ‘commercial interests’.
Well they have to fund their courses (and their Chancellors extortionate wages) from somwhere now their funding has been cut.
I mean what else do you expect from these academics who are only in it for the knowledge & education of others -or perhaps that should read re-education in certain cases..
“All hail our Chinese overlords”…
So much for academic freedom.
China sensors UK universities- quite simple really.
I knew it would be UCL. They’ve sold their soul to China and won’t say boo to a goose if Chinese students are cheating ….just as long as they keep paying £9000 per term.
Where do Chinese overseas police stations figure in the defence review?
Because they are used to spy on dissidents and critics of China. I suppose that’s what you mean.
Well, this is the UK where you are subject to either English law or Scottish law, not Chinese law or Sharia law or Russian law…..If a foreign country wants to arrest one its citizens on British soil there are accepted ways of doing that….thats why extradition treaties and European arrest warrants were invented. Chinese police stations undermine one if the pillars of UK society,
Yep Chinese influence and the under current of Sharia Law – both of which are subversive, have no place in the UK & should be dealt wiith most strenuously by the UK Legal System.
Any forlorn hope I had of either of those being seriously considered never mind implemented dissapeared earlier this year.
probably not even on the menu….
Might be able to order a 999 or 101…
They are quietly ignored. Because we need Chinese to build our over priced nuclear power stations, even though Rolls Royce and BAE have repeatedly offered their much much much cheaper modular SMRs.
The CCP considers every chinese person an agent of the CCP or an enemy of the state if they refuse.
Understood. Its the authoritarian mindset. The Canadians recently had occasion to reprimand India for ‘trespassing’ on their sovereignty.
Can I say Too many?
Maybe they have all come to learn about the Enlightenment and Scottish philosophers?
7
The fact that China is willing to spend large amounts of diplomatic and financial resources to stop one small British city having a meaningless friendship agreement with a Chinese province is why China will never be a world leader.
It’s a poor country that has little chance now of breaking the middle income trap and the vast cost of the police state that the CCP has had to build to keep itself in power is a bigger drain on the economy than its defence budget.
More about saving face, which is very important to people from that part of the world
So conversely if we all call them out for it and identify them as shameful for doing it would they have to change their stance in order to save face ?
nope, they don’t care about that. I would agree with Jim comment that there are real issue with China economy going forward
The CCP/PRC has no right to impose itself on other nations foriegn relations.
You’re right, but they definitely aren’t the only country to do that let’s be honest us and the Americans have done plenty of it over the years.
Well thats OK then , we should all just ignore it …and hope it goes away of its own accord.
That I am afraid is the consequence of political warfare in action. If anyone thinks that was a benign decision they are profoundly wrong. Providing china evidence that it’s political warfare is working will support its decision on where it goes with Taiwan.
This decision will be analysed and considered around how political warfare is effecting the likelihood of the UK supporting any conflict over Taiwan. It’s a very poor and short term decision that places us a very small ( but real ) step closer to a major pacific and possibly world wide conflict….you do not feed the lion.
Hi Jonathan
Reminds me a little of Chamberlain appeasement policy- peace in our time! 😉
Chamberlain was smarter than that, he oversaw a serious British rearming from 1934, way before that piece of paper. He bought time for us as well as sought diplomatic solutions, and when he had to, declared war but on our terms. That rearming from 1934 saved us and brought new innovations in planes, tanks and ships. Compared to now, that’s different to what we see now, much worse when you see the reducing capability of the RN even though the world is becoming a more dangerous place.
WS, pardon my flippant remark, it was tongue in check. You are spot on re your commentary on Neville Chamberlain. To build on your points, he did all he could to try avoid a war. It was certainly not his fault that Hitler was a lying psychopathic evil man.
I always have held the view that dialogue and negotiation is the way. As the adage goes “better a lean piece, than a fat victory”
History has been very unkind to the man.
Yep, the chance of UK supporting the Taiwanese is diminishing daily, we will not have military capability and like France be far to reliant on China for trade and investment to be free to support. It could get to the point where we actually want the conflict to be over quickly with China successfully taking control because anything protracted would be too much for the UK government to handle. Obviously today it would be shock but we don’t appear to be mitigating for it, in fact the opposite we’re doubling down.
I honestly think the west is possibly not now willing to contemplate fighting a world war to strategic exhaustion with a peer power block. The problem is if China believes that, it will launch an invasion of Taiwan, because its whole warfighting paradigm comes from Mao and his writings on protracted war. The Chinese don’t believe in the fast overwhelming warfare as the west has promulgated since the start of the Cold War. It believes in first years of full spectrum political warfare to sap the will of your enemies to fight..before even going kinetic and that the kinetic elements… Read more »
I think you are forgetting the wests primary offensive capability…. Complete economic isolation of China….
the Chinese are totally reliant on the western economic system for their economy to survive…indeed the Chinese are reliant on the rest of the world for just about everything.
Andrew, that is something we tell ourselves to sleep at night, but unfortunately it’s a bit of a mirage..china has spent the last five years in a very significant decoupling from the west. In reality the west needs china more than than china needs the west..what you have to remember is china does not really care if it’s economy collapses as long as it wins…there is a very very good a detailed paper on how china has decoupled from the west and hardened its economy in preparation for war, I would suggest reading the “the next major war” by Dr… Read more »
I tend to agree with them, EU liberalism has screwed us over chasing the profits.
Unless we seriously look to start to bring a large mass of the manufacturing back into The West/Europe/UK
We (UK) soon won’t even have the capability to make our own virgin steel – which really should be a wake up call.
Indeed agree,
Utter disgrace!!
Absolutely disgraceful – I wonder what Sir Kier & his Labour cronies will have to say about that .
I’ll give you a clue its about the same as any of the previous incumbents of his position had to say about Chinese diplomatic infringements & political pressure over the last 20 years- IDS(& maybe Williamson) aside of course.
& thats why it continues.
WIMPS
The expressions pathetic, weak kneed and moral cowardice come to mind not to mention selling their birthright for a mess of pottage! The people responsible for this decision, including those pressing for it are unfit for the positions they hold.
Curious if the national Labour government has given the City of Edinburgh council any support and advice on how to handle this issue?
Trying to be as objective as possible-a couple of things things to bear in mind. One-International Law generally does not allow the secession of a region from a nation that is Internationally recognized. Somaliland is a case in point. It could be argued that the Taiwan issue is similar BUT I would argue that there is a huge grey area about the legitimacy of the Communist takeover in 1948/9 and that real legitimacy lies with the people of Taiwan. In addition, a geographic separation such as that provided by an Island geography and de facto Independence stretching back for three… Read more »
“it wil hurt the feelings of the Chinese people”
Heaven forbid
I am a resident of Edinburgh and a council tax payer. there has been nothing in the Evening news about this. I am disgusted
It was on the BBC website back in June. The council seem to have bowed to pressure from the University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Airport and Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, who all claimed the financial impact would be too great. The authority also hinted it was worried about a cyber-attack as some sort of retribution.
If you allow bullies to prosper they will continue to bully
100% correct and such matters will hardly be broadcast to the masses in China. Its a regime who want total control of every faction on their lives and outside too. The greedy West has allowed China to grow to what it is today. Will we go to save Taiwan? No and not sure the USA will either as it would certainly not be popular with the US population. We need to start making and doing our own production of goods here in the West more and more and that will impact China more than any empty words from wimpy governments… Read more »
We have the same problem here in Sheffield, the university has a huge proportion of Chinese students, and I mean huge, the city had changed into litttle China while the council bend and court and beg the Chinese for more investment, including a famous trip to China by a large council delegation to offer the city to any Chinese state backed baron who wants a piece of it. It puts us in a weak position when dealing with Dictatorships. There is no way Sheffield City Council would ever dare to offend its cash cow master.
Well I, sadly, often think of Universities as just another extension of the enemy within, and this does not change my view.
The Western so called intellectual elite; namely those in control of our benighted universities are beholden to the Chinese. Its not just Edinburgh, its widespread and general. They sold and relegated British culture down the river years ago. Its inevitable, if we are to have a country at all that the whole gutless lot of them are going to need a thorough re-education from that other Cultural Revolution.
Further I would argue that Education should be an arm of our Defence posture, because as we think so we are. That means unsuitable candidates should be sifted and moved to posts where they can cause little or no subversive disruption. In other words give them a taste of the Chinese medicine they wish on the rest of us!
The thing is their funding has been severley cut over the years since Blair ruined further education in the UK changing its structure and introducing the cash cow that was student fees. Cameron subsequently milked it as much as he could. Whether you agree with fees or not, this resulted in the universities having to chase foreign (student) investment to balance books as they bring in far more money than UK based students. He who pays the piper calls the tune so this subsequently results in ‘power’ being provisioned to foreign countries some of whom (you can decide which )… Read more »
To be fair I think we’re already fooked, all the so called leaders from the west are shittin themselves from Russia and china so let’s just spend defence money on a magnificent British piss up every year.
Pretty pathetic.Especially given that the emerging geopolitical situation means that decoupling economic ties with the PRC is probably inevitable anyway.
Scotland the brave? Scotland the wimp!
That’s disgusting.
Shameful, chasing the Yuan rather than what is right.
I thought the 2 areas of devolved governments don’t have authority are foreign policy and defence?
I’m sure I’m right. Therefore it must be the UK government that have decided not to recognise Taiwan?