Taiwanese Cast Votes

Communist threats to sink U.S. warships off the coast and launch more mock invasions of islets in the Taiwan Strait failed to dampen election enthusiasm on this troubled island where voters for the first time in their nation’s history went to the polls today to elect a new president.

Even more humiliating for the mainland were pollsters’ predictions that the electorate will give an absolute majority to 73-year-old incumbent President Lee Teng-hui - the man Beijing has denounced as a two-faced villain who advocates reunification with the mainland but secretly works towards Taiwan’s independence.

Lee is a technocrat who completed Taiwan’s transition from a one-party autocracy run by the Kuomintang (Nationalists) to a multiparty democracy. He is now set to become the first democratically elected Chinese leader in history.

Although China contends Taiwan is only a renegade province and has no right to nurture diplomatic ties with other nations, the democratic status of the island’s new president will make it difficult for countries to shun him.

With the last phase of its transition to democracy completed on today, Taiwan has upgraded its status in the international arena.

This was immediately reflected in its rhetoric about “eventual” reunification with the mainland.