Anti-Secession Law

The Anti-Secession Law is a law of the People's Republic of China, passed by the 3rd Session of the 10th National People's Congress. It was ratified on March 14, 2005, and went into effect immediately. Although the law, at ten articles, is relatively short, Article 8 formalized the long-standing policy of the PRC to use military means against Taiwanese independence in the event peaceful means become impossible.

Background

The re-election of Chen Shui-bian of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to the Taiwanese presidency, led many to conclude that there has been an increase in Taiwan independence sentiment and that a new Taiwanese identity is emerging on the island which is opposed to identification with China. During the 2004 Taiwanese Legislative Election, the strategy of the pan-Green coalition was to try to capitalize on this trend to win a majority in the Legislative Yuan of Taiwan. Among some Taiwanese Independence supporters, it is believed that a pan-green majority could force a crucial referendum for constitutional reform and, perhaps, to further move the island toward de jure independence. Many Taiwanese independence supporters, including former President Lee Teng-Hui, argued that Taiwan should declare independence before 2008 on the theory that international pressure over the Beijing Olympics would prevent the PRC from using force against Taiwan.

These events in late 2004 caused a great deal of alarm in Beijing. Observers indicated that many in Beijing believed that its policies toward Taiwan had failed both because it did not have sufficient incentives to gain Taiwanese public support for unification and at the same time, it seemed that many in Taiwan did not take Beijing's stated threats of force seriously. The Taiwanese government had defined the status quo in such a way that a de jure declaration of independence could be argued to not represent a change in the status quo.