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To: rsie who wrote (13820)	5/18/2000 11:12:00 AM
From: rsie	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 15132

No Blockade Threatening, Taiwan Says NewsMax.com Wednesday, May 17, 2000 Red China is not preparing to blockade Taiwan?s main seaport, the island?s defense ministry says. Commenting on an Australian newspaper report that the mainland Chinese plan to launch a blockade of the Kaohsiung seaport, defense ministry spokesman Major-General Kung Fan-ting told Reuters new service: "Right now there is no information on this at all. We urge people not to listen to rumors." The port at Kaohsiung in southern Taiwan handles almost 70 percent of the island?s trade and is the world?s third largest container port. According to Australia?s Sydney Morning Herald, Beijing plans to use a blockade of the key port to force the Taiwanese government to open negotiations on the island?s future status. Quoting an unnamed source within an Australian intelligence service that shares information with its counterpart in the United States, the Herald said the planned blockade would be aimed at forcing Taiwan to open early talks on reunification with the mainland. "It is understood the U.S. is taking the blockade preparations seriously as fears mount in Beijing that Taiwan is drifting steadily towards independence despite mainland threats of war," the newspaper reported, quoting a "senior Australian Government official" as saying, "The Americans seem to think it is possible or even likely." Beijing has been rattling sabers ever since the new Taiwanese president, Chen Shui-bian, advocated independence for the island while still a candidate for the presidency. Beijing has made it clear that it will not tolerate independence and insists that the "One China" policy is the only option open to Taipei. A Pentagon study on the military balance across the Taiwan Strait last year warned that despite improvements in Taiwan's anti-submarine forces, China would "retain the capability to interdict Taiwan's sea lanes of communications and blockade the island's principal maritime ports." The paper says that U.S. intelligence analysts think the port on Taiwan's southwest coast, which last year handled about 300 million tons of cargo carried by more than 18,000 ships, could be relatively easily blockaded because there are only two narrow channels deep enough for ships to enter and leave the harbor. The United States, the Herald reports, believes that China's submarines could prevent cargo ships from using these channels or even sink a ship in the main channel into Kaohsiung used by the biggest vessels. Noting that "it would be almost impossible for the U.S. and its allies, including Australia, to abandon Taiwan to its fate if it came under mainland attack," the Herald suggested the possibility that Beijing could launch a trade blockade without making an overt military threat to Taiwan. "Intelligence sources say Beijing could attempt to justify a blockade on the grounds that almost every major international government acknowledges its claim over Taiwan," the newspaper explained. But Taiwan, which also shares information with the United States, maintains that there is no intelligence data that a blockade is in the works, for September or any other time.