Ex-president says failure of UN referendum would harm Taiwan

Feb 22, 2008, 10:04 GMT

Taipei - Taiwan's former president Lee Teng-hui Friday warned of the consequence of the failure of two referendums initiated by both ruling and opposition parties on the island's bid to gain accession to the United Nations.

'If both referendums fail, it would create the impression that Taiwan people do not want to join the United Nations and this would seriously harm Taiwan,' Lee told reporters in Taiwan.

He called on the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the opposition Nationalist Party, or Kuomintang (KMT), to find way to resolve the issue.

DPP has initiated a referendum on the island joining the United Nations under Taiwan title, while the KMT has initiated another one on using any title to seek to return to the global body, which ousted Taipei to admit Beijing in 1971.

Both referendums will be held alongside the presidential election on March 22, but the chance of their success was slim due mainly to the requirements that at least half of the 18 million eligible voters must go to vote and that more than 50 per cent of the voters cast the yes ballots.

As it is almost impossible for either the KMT and the DPP to separately rally more than 9 million voters to vote for their respective referendums, there is little chance either vote would pass.

Lee said the two camps must hold political negotiation and cooperate with each other to find a solution to the problem. 'It would be best for the two camps to defer the holding of the referendums to allow them to have more time to deal with the problem,' he said.

The United States, an informal ally and biggest arms supplier for Taiwan, has strongly opposed the DPP's referendum, believing it would intensify cross-strait tension on the grounds that the use of the island's unofficial Taiwan title rather than its official Republic of China title to join the world body is tantamount to changing the island's status.

China, a rival of Taiwan since the two sides split at the end of a civil war in 1949, has regarded the planned referendum as the first step towards declaring independence, a move it has repeated said would lead to a cross-strait war.