Alessio Patalano

This week, the central committee of the Chinese Communist party will issue a ‘resolution on history’. It will enshrine the official historical narrative of the Xi Jinping era. Only two CCP leaders have issued a resolution of this kind before: Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. Mao’s resolution set out his role as China’s sole leader; Deng’s, the conditions for the country’s economic focus. And Xi’s? Details are yet to be revealed, but it is expected to reinforce the idea of China’s historical destiny, what Xi calls the ‘great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation’. For Xi, the project of national rejuvenation is inherently linked to the reunification with Taiwan, the only part of the old republic that did not become communist in 1949.

The fate of Hong Kong should make us worried about Taiwan. China’s introduction of a new security law for Hong Kong — which hollowed out the spirit of the ‘one country, two systems’ notion — is a powerful reminder of the importance of sovereignty for the Chinese Communist party. We should ask whether Taiwan is next on the list. In the past few months, as the world battled to control the Covid-19 pandemic, Beijing indulged in increased military activity across the Taiwan Strait. The purpose was to remind the newly re-elected Taiwanese president, Tsai Ing-wen, that Taiwan is an inherent part of China and that there is no alternative to reunification with the mainland by 2049.