Welcome to this special edition of “HARDtalk” with me, Zeinab Badawi, from the Taiwanese capital, Taipei. People here in Taiwan which is self-governed live under a constant threat from China which lies about 160 kilometers across the waters.

Beijing claims Taiwan is part of its territory and in the past few months has carried out hundreds of military sources near Taiwan leading to speculation that it is preparing for an invasion. Taiwan has also been subjected to cyberattacks from China. My guest is the Taiwanese digital minister, Audrey Tang. Can Taiwan really forge its own path?

Minister Audrey Tang in Taipei, welcome to HARDtalk.

President Xi of China reiterated at the recent Chinese Communist Party Congress that “China wants to strive for the prospect of peaceful unification with Taiwan,” but that he will “never promise to give up the option to use force.”

Just sum up briefly the mood for us, the reaction to that possibly new threat.

So people have not been at all worried by this renewed threat?

OK, because China has claimed Taiwan as part of its territory since 1949.

But now, according to intelligence in the United States, President Xi wants to accelerate the program and unify Taiwan by 2027.

So you’ve got this timeframe.

We’ve seen increased military activity, spy planes, bombers, missiles being fired over the Taiwan Strait. Surely, you cannot discount the possibility that there could be a military conflict.

You sound quite relaxed about it, if I may say, Minister Tang.

Because the Foreign Minister of Taiwan, Joseph Wu, says “China’s behavior is provocative and threatening regional peace and stability.”

I mean, Taiwan is the reddest of red lines for China, isn’t it?

All right, as you say, quite rightly, you face cyber attacks, millions every day…

..from China, I put it to you that Kitsch Yen-Fan from the global China hub at the Atlantic Council says, “We are already at war. This is a constant thing.”

I mean, is he right? Is Taiwan effectively engaged in a cyber war with China?

You’ve broken many glass ceilings. You’re a hacker turned minister. You were a child prodigy. You established your own technology company at the age of 15.

You were involved in the Sunflower student protests in 2014 to try to avoid the fast tracking of a trade bill with China.

You are the first openly transgender minister anywhere in the world. So, you know, a first there.

But given that your own department is the Ministry of Digital Affairs, you need to strengthen Taiwan’s digital protection.

So how capable is your infrastructure of withstanding these cyberattacks from China?

So the idea, part of a digital strategy, is to keep information about Taiwan flowing.

As part of that ambition, you have proposed a satellite trial program to try to guarantee internet services across Taiwan.

But given the current tensions with China, these talks are pretty urgent, aren’t they, between private sector companies and the Taiwanese government?

One thing that Taiwan is hugely significant for in the global economy is the fact that you provide about 90% of the world’s advanced microchips.

And these are of course, critical in all sorts of ways, microchips we use in our phones, in cars, in laptops and so on.

And one Taiwanese company, TSMC, in fact, accounts for half of the global market. How does this affect your relationship with China? Because China is one of your big partners, economically, trading, and yet it’s this foe that we’ve been discussing.

And there’s talk about a silicon shield, that this kind of supply of microchips can protect you from an attack by China.

Yet, on the other hand, it could also prove a very attractive, valuable acquisition for China. So, how do you see it?

A symbol of trust, but does it protect you from Chinese aggression?

I mean, another paradox which is quite puzzling about Taiwan is, you are part of the government which came to power in 2016 when President Tsai Ing Wen, who leads the Democratic Progressive Party, the DPP, won the elections very decisively.

What is the position of the Government when it comes to independence? Because polls consistently show that the Taiwanese people don’t want independence, and yet they don’t want unification with China. So how does the government reconcile this?

But you are part of a government — I appreciate you are nonpartisan and not a member of the DPP — but President Tsai Ing Wen’s comments are quite puzzling.

For example, in 2020, she told the BBC that, “We don’t have a need to declare independence. We are an independent country already, and call ourselves the Republic of China.” What does she mean by that?

You’re talking about when Chiang Kai-shek left China, having been defeated by the Communists in 1949 and fled to Taiwan with 2 million of his followers, and we had the Republic of China there.

But it’s still not clear, the government or the president not backing formal independence, really, and yet saying we reject unification.

You use words like “country”, but actually only about a dozen very small states in the Caribbean or Latin America…

..and the Vatican recognizes Taiwan as a nation. I mean, you’re losing that argument.

But can you say you are a country when, as I just said, major countries, the United States, all of the European Union don’t recognize Taiwan as a nation state? You don’t have a seat at the United Nations.

So you exist as a country only in the digital space. Is that what you’re saying?

Eric Chu, the Leader of the Opposition Kuomintang or KMT Party, criticizes the DPP, the President, for not maintaining a dialogue with China.

I mean, even the Americans, the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, and the Chinese Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, held talks on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in September. They talked for an hour and a half.

Why is President Tsai here not accepting to talk directly with the Chinese?

But I mean, she says she will only talk if Beijing drops that precondition that Taiwan is part of China. [laughs] And so you’ve got a deadlock. They’re not going to do that. President Xi has just reiterated unification must happen, and so you have no dialogue.

But, I mean, not even that’s taken place. I mean, are you encouraging her to do that?

All right, but it’s not just the political question where there is a lack of clarity. Even Taiwan’s defense strategy is lacking. Taiwan’s former top military official, staff Admiral Lee Hsi-ming, who retired three years ago, says “the Taiwanese army is not prepared and that it must think strategically,” which he says it isn’t doing.

His criticisms highlight the inertia in the Taiwanese army because it was the armed wing of the KMT, the Chinese Nationalist Party, that ruled under martial law for decades. And so therefore, it’s not reinvented itself sufficiently for the modern era.

So what do you say to that criticism?

Yes.

But I’m talking about military hardware, really. That’s what the admiral’s criticisms were.