[TIME] The 2005 TIME 100

[sovereignty (千萬一定要通過啊)]

最新一期的 TIME，不知道 newstand 出了沒，這是在網站上先看的。
訂閱者才能先看，這篇文章配上下面這張照片
http://i.timeinc.net/time/2005/time100/leaders/images/100shui-bian.jpg

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Chen Shui-bian

Taking It to the Brink

By MICHAEL ELLIOTT

The Taiwan Strait is some-times called the most dangerous place in the world.
On one side of the waterway is mainland China; on the other, the island of
Taiwan, where Nationalist forces, led by Chiang Kai-shek, retreated after
their defeat by the communists in China's civil war. Beijing regards Taiwan
as a "renegade province" and has said it is willing to use force if needed to
prevent the island's independence. The U.S., for its part, is pledged to
defend Taiwan if the island is attacked without provocation.

The President of Taiwan, Chen Shui-bian, seems to relish living on the edge.
Born to a poor family in 1951, he symbolizes Taiwan's transition from
Chiang's dictatorship to democracy and from a situation in which political
power was dominated by refugees from the mainland to one in which native
Taiwanese like himself lead the nation. Having narrowly won a second
four-year term last year after surviving an apparent assassination attempt,
Chen, 54, will remain in office until 2008.

Beijing can't stand him. China's leaders call him a "splittist" determined to
break Taiwan away from the mainland for good. At times, Chen's rhetoric seems
excessive, even in Taiwan's boisterous democracy. Voters denied him a victory
in legislative elections last December, preferring parties that seek a
greater accommodation with China, and since then Chen has deliberately
reached out to Beijing. His overtures, however, have not been received with
obvious rapture; last month China passed a law reiterating its willingness to
use force should the island declare formal independence.

Though Chen summoned a million people into the streets on March 26 to protest
that law, don't rule out the possibility that he may yet make a deal with
Beijing. "I am a maker of history," he told TIME last year. If that turns out
to be so, let's hope it's because Chen Shui-bian proves to be a force for
reconciliation across the Taiwan Strait, not for war over it.

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