Who will be Taiwan’s next president?
The election will be fought on how the island should navigate a superpower showdown
THE CHINESE COMMUNIsT PARTY (CCP) has never ruled Taiwan. But how to deal with it and its insistence on eventual unification with the island has always been the central issue in Taiwan’s national politics. As campaigning begins for the presidential elections due next January, the stakes are especially high. Almost every day China sends fighter jets into the Taiwan Strait, often crossing Taiwan’s de facto maritime border; America is expanding its military bases and stepping up exercises with allies across the Indo-Pacific. The next president will take office with the island at the centre of a bubbling superpower showdown.
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This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline “The search for a middle way”
From the June 3rd 2023 edition
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