How the tiny Marshall islands, Eswatini, Palau and Paraguay thought they could undermine the One China Principle at the UN General Assembly

In an increasingly turbulent global time the United Nations General Assembly in New York had clearly a lot to discuss. Obviously, Israel’s excruciatingly painful war in Gaza and Lebanon was at the forefront while Ukraine’s ambition to attack mainland Russia is paralysing all thinking citizens of the world with a fair amount of space between the ears.

Another important development from New York that requires attention though is that during the UN’s inaugural Summit of the Future, four super small states teamed up to request the impossible, Taiwan to join the UN system in the future. The latter is a paradox however as China is already represented in the UN system and more so it is a historic permanent member of the UN’s Security Council. So, how on earth is it possible that these four tiny UN member states (Marshall islands, Palau, Eswatini and Paraguay) ask for an island that belongs to China to be separately represented in the UN system?

Let’s do a short history class first. In another General Assembly, this time in 1971, the famous Resolution 2758 reads that there is but one China in the world, Taiwan is part of China, and the Government of the People’s Republic of China is the sole legal government representing the whole of China. The same goes for the 1943 Cairo Declaration and and the 1945 Potsdam Proclamation which ordered that Taiwan is an absolute part of China.

In short, the UN Resolution established the One China Principle that the entire UN System has been upholding the One China Principle in dealing with Taiwan, as a province of China. In fact, adhering to the UN System is a sine qua non for member states to join the UN anyway.

Of course, it is well known that the world’s biggest economy has historically undermined the One China Principle, encouraging and incentivising Taiwan’s administration to propagate about an imaginary “independence”.

However, having tiny UN member states like the Marshall Islands undermine the One China Principle, that they had anyway adhered to when they signed up to the UN System in the first place, is utterly obscene. It is like a small and insignificant country in the world comes to the UNGA and claims that one of the 5 islands of Marshall Islands e.g. Kole should be represented in the UN system at the UN’s Summit of the Future!? This is surreal, besides illegal and paranoid.

Though if one puts a magnifying lens on Marshall islands, he will notice the special historic relations of the country with the US (Compact of Free Association with the US, 1983) and that their currency is none other than the US dollar.  Close ties are uncovered with the other three small countries too.

Then one is inescapably begged to infer that possibly the Marshall Islands and the other three received a small gift in US dollars, in order to come to New York and suggest the illegal, a deviation from the UN legal system.

In any case, China’s stance has been clear on any attempt by any state to undermine the One China Principle. How prudent is it though for 4 tiniest member states to start a diplomatic war with China out of New York?

This reminds us of genious Peter Seller’s state of the art 1959 movie, “The Mouse that Roared”, whereby a tiny state in the middle of nowhere starts a war against the US. Funny as the movie has been, in real sad life and particularly in our turbulent modern times that for some “naive” people are the shy beginning of World War III, four tiny countries declaring the war against China through a unprecedented diplomatic fiasko of undermining the One China principle, is overtly idiotic.

In addition, it is a sign of the times to manipulate powerless states to speak against the One China Principle. It also tells that the US is super mindful when it comes to China’s large economic and military power, as Biden spoke generally about peace in the Straits and didn’t have the nerves to say anything like what Eswatini said, but instead let the mice that roared attempt to defy China.

At the end of the day however the One China Principle cannot be undermined in the UN System as all member states have already adhered to it, even the four very small ones, and anything else is illegal and part of a coordinated plot to destabilise further our unstable world that is no stranger to horrific wars and crises whatsoever and should avoid new ones.