English Article

Red Lines

Ch ina ’s response to L ithuan ia is to ensure other countr ies do not take the same route.

The European Union (EU) has found itself caught in a bind over the worsening tensions between Lithuania and China. Last week, top EU diplomats met to find a way to de-escalate tensions before a planned EU-China summit, expected in the coming weeks. After a two-day meet of Foreign Ministers in France, the EU’s Foreign Policy Chief, Josep Borrell, said the grouping expressed “solidarity” with Lithuania, which is a member of the EU and NATO. He, however, stopped short of announcing any concrete actions. The EU has watched nervously as one of its members faces the full weight of coercive Chinese diplomacy, even as the grouping keeps one eye on its substantial $828 billion annual trade with Beijing. The tensions began last year after Lithuania announced the setting up of a Taiwanese Representative Office. Such offices are hardly unusual across Europe, or in much of the world. The difference, however, was in the naming. The offices elsewhere are not called Taiwanese but are named, as in New Delhi, Taipei Economic and Cultural Centres because of the “one China policy” followed by most countries, including India, that do not have formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan. Lithuania has said the name did not change its “one China policy”, but for Beijing, the move crossed one of its most sensitive red lines. The opening of the office followed a number of developments that strained relations after the election of a coalition government that has underlined the importance of “democratic values” in the foreign policy of the first former Soviet republic that declared independence, as well as pushed closer ties with Washington.