Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
05TAIPEI3712
2005-09-08 09:59:00
CONFIDENTIAL
American Institute Taiwan, Taipei
Cable title:  

RESPONDING TO CHINESE BAN ON TAIWAN PARTICIPATION

Tags:  KIPR TW IPR 
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080959Z Sep 05
C O N F I D E N T I A L TAIPEI 003712 

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/08/2015
TAGS: KIPR TW IPR
SUBJECT: RESPONDING TO CHINESE BAN ON TAIWAN PARTICIPATION
IN THE HONG KONG IPR SEMINAR

REF: A. HONG KONG 4206


B. HONG KONG 4207

Classified By: AIT Acting Director David Keegan, Reasons 1.4 b/d

C O N F I D E N T I A L TAIPEI 003712

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/08/2015
TAGS: KIPR TW IPR
SUBJECT: RESPONDING TO CHINESE BAN ON TAIWAN PARTICIPATION
IN THE HONG KONG IPR SEMINAR

REF: A. HONG KONG 4206


B. HONG KONG 4207

Classified By: AIT Acting Director David Keegan, Reasons 1.4 b/d


1. (C) AIT Taipei received word from Taiwan Ministry of
Justice on September 6 that the application for a Hong Kong
visa for Prosecutor Sun Chih-yuan had been denied by the Hong
Kong authorities. The MOJ requested assistance from AIT.
Shortly thereafter, we received word from the Taiwan
Intellectual Property Office (TIPO) that it had learned from
its counterparts at the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) that
the other three experts tapped to attend the HK IPR seminar,
all of whom already possessed valid Hong Kong visas, would
not be allowed to enter Hong Kong.


2. (U) AIT Econoff subsequently spoke to AmConGen Hong Kong
staff who verified the report that Taiwan experts would not
be allowed to enter Hong Kong to attend this event. We
informed the Taiwan participants that we were unable to
assist them to enter Hong Kong and therefore would have to
cancel their plane tickets and hotel reservations.


3. (C) On September 7, Prosecutor Chu Ying-shyang called on
AIT to express MOJ's concern that Hong Kong's prohibition on
Taiwan experts entering the city for the purposes of
attending the US Government-sponsored IPR seminar could set a
precedent for future Mainland actions to prevent Taiwan from
participating in regional activities designed to promote
cooperation and information sharing in law enforcement or
other areas. We responded that we felt it was very
unfortunate that the Hong Kong authorities had chosen to deny
entry to the Taiwan IPR experts in spite of the Herculean
efforts of Embassy Beijing and AmConGen Hong Kong to ensure
they would be able to attend this event. We informed Chu
that, although the seminar would still go on with limited
participation, it in no way indicated a change in the U.S.
posture towards Taiwan participation in appropriate regional
activities. We subsequently learned from AmConGen Hong Kong
that all of the Chinese participants had withdrawn, including
those from Hong Kong.

============================================= =============
Comment: Taiwan Participation Important for U.S. Interests
============================================= =============


4. (C) Intellectual property crimes take place with little
respect for borders and the nature of digital and
internet-based piracy makes borders even less of a barrier to
pirates. As an economy that has recently made great strides
in intellectual property protection but is still facing a
significant IP protection challenge, Taiwan stands to both
contribute to and benefit from participation in this type of
regional information and expertise-sharing event. We are
extremely appreciative of the efforts of our colleagues in
Beijing and Hong Kong to attempt to make the participation of
Taiwan experts in this seminar a reality.


5. (C) We see increasingly persistent attempts by China to
deny participation by Taiwan experts in regional activities
that have no bearing on sovereignty issues and threaten
significant U.S. policy objectives including our national
security. In the past month, Chinese pressure on Vietnam to
refuse to invite Taiwan to participate in a co-sponsored APEC
meeting on counter-terrorism led to the decision to move the
meeting out of Vietnam. Chinese port officials expressed
their reluctance to participate in a Container Security
Initiative (CSI) workshop in Washington unless Port of
Kaohsiung representatives were not invited or invitations
were channeled through Beijing. Chinese efforts to block
Taiwan participation and effectively sabotage this AmConGen
Hong Kong organized IPR seminar are merely the latest in what
appears to be a string of increasingly bold efforts to
marginalize Taiwan in the region and send a strong message
that for China, the importance of blocking Taiwan
participation in any international forum, even the
participation of experts with no implications for
sovereignty, trumps cooperation with the U.S., even on our
most important policy goals.


6. (C) We believe that it is important that the U.S.
response make it clear that while we continue to support the
One-China Policy and want to cooperate with China in areas
where we have mutual interests, we do not accept Chinese
efforts to exclude Taiwan expert participation in regional
events that have no implications for sovereignty and are
designed to discuss regional problems where Taiwan has a
legitimate role to play.
KEEGAN