Taiwan’s foreign ministry said it has protested South Africa’s request while preparing for the ‘worst-case scenario.’
Taiwan’s foreign ministry said on Oct. 22 it has refused to move Taipei’s de facto embassy out of South Africa’s capital, Pretoria.
South Africa’s foreign ministry, the Department of International Relations and Cooperation, confirmed on Oct. 18 that it had requested Taiwan to rebrand the Taipei Liaison Office as a trade office and relocate from Pretoria to Johannesburg, which the department called the country’s economic hub.
In response to Taipei’s criticism that South Africa is yielding to pressure from Beijing, the department explained that the request was made because the country does not have formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan, and the move was meant to “correct the anomaly” of having the Taiwan office located in the capital city.
On Tuesday, Taiwan’s spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Jeff Liu, told reporters the department had summoned South Africa’s representative in Taipei to protest and reject South Africa’s ultimatum after receiving it on Oct. 7.
According to Liu, South Africa’s foreign ministry first communicated the request in December 2023, which was followed by a written request in April this year. The Taipei Liaison Office was given six months to move. On Oct. 7, South Africa’s foreign ministry told the liaison office to move out of Pretoria by the end of October or be shut down.
South Africa severed its diplomatic ties with Taiwan to establish formal relations with communist China on Jan. 1, 1998. Before the switch, South Africa reached a new deal with Taiwan, including an agreement to maintain liaison offices.
Liu said the demand to rebrand and move the liaison office “blatantly violates the spirit and the text of the 1997 agreement that allows both parties to set up a liaison office in the other country’s capital.”
“We will never accept such unreasonable demands,” Liu said, adding that the department is prepared for various contingencies.
On Oct. 21, Taiwan’s Foreign Minister Lin Chia-Lung told legislators on the Foreign and National Defense Committee that he hopes there’s room for negotiation but is prepared for the “worst-case scenario.”
Lin said a number of countries, including the United States, Japan, and the Czech Republic, have helped Taiwan in its negotiations with South Africa. He also noted dissent within South Africa’s new coalition government.
A spokesperson for South Africa’s Department of International Relations and Cooperation told The Epoch Times that the department will continue to engage with the Taipei Liaison Office through appropriate and official channels.
The Chinese regime applauded South Africa’s move last week, with spokeswoman Mao Ning saying Beijing “appreciates South Africa’s correct decision.”
In 2017, Taiwan was forced to change the names of its representative offices in Nigeria, Bahrain, Ecuador, Jordan, and Dubai. The rebranded office in Nigeria was also moved from the capital, Abuja, to the country’s largest city, Lagos.
Questioning Lin on Monday, Democratic Progressive Party lawmaker Wang Ting-yu expressed concern that South Africa’s demand could cause “chain reactions” in the region, including in neighboring Eswatini, the only African country that maintains formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan.
Meanwhile, on Oct. 16, Taiwan unveiled its new de facto embassy in Mumbai. The new Economic and Cultural Center is the Taiwan government’s third office in India.
In response, Beijing lodged “stern representations,” saying Taiwan is “an integral part of China’s territory.”
The Republic of China (ROC), Taiwan’s official name, was founded in 1912 in China. The ROC government, under Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek, relocated to the island in 1949 after losing control of mainland China to Mao Zedong’s communist forces in the Chinese Civil War.
Absorbing Taiwan remains one of Beijing’s top goals. The Chinese Communist Party, which has never ruled Taiwan, considers the self-governed island to be a renegade province and has never ruled out the possibility of using force to control it.