Taiwan Relations with the Rest of Asia

Taiwan's international relations with the rest of Asia is a matter on it's own. The sensible and very much controversial debate about their political status. The main issue lies on the separation of The Republic of China (ROC, known also as Taiwan) and The People's Republic of China (known as PRC or Communist China). The firm status on both sides is to not have any diplomatic relation with a country that supports the other.

The 1970s saw a switch in diplomatic recognition from the Republic of China to the People's Republic of China with countries like the United States, Japan, and Canada making the switch during that decade. In October 1971, the UN General Assembly declared 'that the representatives of the Government of the People's Republic of China are the only lawful representatives of China to the United Nations' and thus do not regard the Republic of China as legitimately representing the whole of China.

Many attempts by the Republic of China to rejoin the UN, in recent years, have not made it past committee, under fierce opposition and threatened vetoes from the PRC. The recent resolutions have all emphasized that Resolution 2758, replacing the ROC with the PRC in 1971, only addressed the question of who should have China's seat in the UN rather than whether an additional seat for the Taiwan Area can be created to represent the 23 million people on Taiwan and ROC's other islands. Today, only 23 states officially recognize the Republic of China, none of them in Asia.

On less official terms, the ROC is involved in a complex dispute for control over the Spratly Islands with the PRC, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and possibly Brunei; and over the Paracel Islands, occupied by the PRC, but claimed by Vietnam and ROC.

The relations between the Republic of China with the People's Republic of China, which controls mainland China, have been complicated by history and politics. Neither the government of the Republic of China nor the government of the People's Republic of China sees their relations as foreign relations. The ROC is the Republic of China, and due to constitutional reasons, neither the ROC nor the PRC recognizes each other as a legitimate government.