TAIPEI: Taiwan’s people should spurn China’s events to commemorate the end of World War Two, including a military parade in Beijing, given Chinese “distortion” of history and threats against the island, Taipei’s top China-policy maker said on Friday.
China, which views democratic Taiwan as its own territory, has invited Taiwanese veterans who fought against Japan to the parade next month which will be overseen by President Xi Jinping.
Taiwan has denounced China for using this year’s 80th anniversary of the war’s end for political purposes against Taipei, saying Beijing has falsely claimed it was the Communist Party that led the fighting against Japan rather than the Republic of China government, which at the time ruled China.
The republican government then fled to Taiwan in 1949 after finally being defeated by Mao Zedong, who then established the People’s Republic of China, while Republic of China remains Taiwan’s official name.
In a video released by his office, Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council Minister Chiu Chui-cheng said the People’s Republic of China did not even exist during World War Two.
