TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — The global community must uphold the current international order to protect democracies like Taiwan, Lithuania, and Ukraine, from authoritarian expansion, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said in a Telegraph op-ed published Monday (Aug. 8)
Landsbergis pointed out that the world’s security architecture is “creaking dangerously.” There have been numerous attempts to shatter international peace and stability and increasing geopolitical tension and conflict, which have tested the global community’s ability to preserve “strategic attention,” he said.
To respond to this emerging challenge, the foreign minister said the world must find the strength to safeguard the global security architecture. “We cannot allow ourselves to be overwhelmed. And we have to prepare for the long haul,” he said.
Landsbergis said that appeasement does not lead to peace, mentioning Munich in 1938 and the 2008 invasion of Georgia as examples. This strategy only encourages dictators to see the free world as “weak and irresolute,” he said, adding that it “encourages them to start new wars on an even greater scale.”
He said that some observers believed Ukraine’s desire to join the EU and NATO could be dropped in order to satisfy Russia after it invaded the central European country in 2014.
However, it is now evident it did not lead to peace, the foreign minister said.
With regard to China’s increasing global intimidation, Landsbergis said China began a trade war with Lithuania since it allowed Taiwan to establish a representative office with the name “Taiwan” last summer. Now, Beijing has launched ballistic missiles near Taiwan and deployed military ships and aircraft across the median line of the Taiwan Strait following U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit.
“There is a temptation to close the eyes to blatant threats to snuff out one of the most vibrant free societies and progressive democracies in Taiwan,” he said. However, he doubted China would stop its expansionism even if the world was willing to make a deal to “buy peace.”
Thus, the foreign minister called for a global order that would let democracies fall by the wayside in the face of encroaching authoritarianism. “The free world cannot and will not allow Taiwan to become a second Ukraine.”
Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) on Tuesday (Aug. 9) extended gratitude to Landsbergis for bringing attention to Taiwan’s situation. It said that the democratic community should unite at this critical moment, per a MOFA press release.
“Let us fight against authoritarian expansion and protect democratic values together, and prevent authoritarian forces from provoking unwarranted and wanton rampages,” MOFA said.
The foreign ministry urged the world to condemn China's “unreasonable military aggression” and to unite with democratic Taiwan in order to maintain the rules-based international order and safeguard the freedom, openness, peace and stability of the Indo-Pacific region.
