The AIBs 2022 and Taiwan Forum in London

In 2017, China challenged Rti’s membership of AIB and sought to replace it with China Central Television (CCTC). Faced with this challenge, Rti issued a resolute statement detailing its position which was ultimately supported by several AIB Executive Committee member countries, including the UK, France and Germany, securing its association membership. In 2022, Rti served on the AIB Executive Committee for the third consecutive year, leading Chairperson Cheryl Lai to observe that given such a difficult international environment, the re-election of Rti as an executive board member is proof that the international media continues to support the right of media in democratic and free countries to speak out. In the future, Rti will continue to proactively expand its international space, help the government promote international affairs while establishing substantive and stable channels for bilateral exchange, she said.

As a result of AIB’s long-term support, Rti has been able to develop more international contacts. Moreover, changes in the international situation in recent years, such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine, have caused the world to pay greater attention to the situation in the Taiwan Strait with more countries coming to realize the importance of Taiwan as it fights on the front line to defend news media freedom in the Mandarin Chinese language speaking world. Indeed, given its limited international space, bringing together the government and private sector in Taiwan to organize this international community activity offered ample evidence that Taiwan is a capable democratic ally. In addition, we very much believed that as a national broadcaster, Rti would be able to use the “2022 Taiwan Forum in London” to facilitate tangible exchange and interaction. As such, Rti also leveraged the joint holding of the event with AIB to meet political and business leaders in the UK with an interest in Taiwan, while reiterating the country’s determination to resolve disputes peacefully.

President Tsai Ing-wen said that Taiwan has already made impressive strides in its pursuit of media freedom and pointed out that Reporters without Borders named it one of the countries with the freest media in Asia. At the same time, and with the idea of press freedom in mind, the Ministry of Digital Affairs (MODA) was recently established with the mission of further enhancing media literacy and improving national cyber security. Tsai noted that Taiwan has worked assiduously to create a free and open media environment and is both willing and prepared to assist the international community in the promotion of media freedom.

Minister of Digital Affairs Audrey Tang spoke to the gathering virtually and shared with those in attendance how Taiwan has coped with cyberattacks and threats from its authoritarian neighbor, while also fighting fake information with humor. Tang emphasized that Taiwan is a resilient island and that various countermeasures have been planned in the event the Internet is paralyzed in a possible future attack. One of the core tasks of MODA is to ensure the country is digitally resilient in the face of various attacks and threats, enhancing adaptability so as to protect the hard-earned democratic and free way of life in Taiwan.

In her speech at the “2022 Taiwan Forum in London”, Rti board member and Director of the Taiwan Digital Diplomacy Association Kuo Chia-yo pointed out that diplomacy can also be conducted with a keyboard and offered a new model to combat authoritarian regimes in the new era. She noted that the borderless Internet enables groups with shared values to establish digital tool alliances, presenting the example of the “Milk Tea Alliance” as reflecting the democratic values of Taiwan and India. Another group worked with Ukrainian nationals in Taiwan to raise funds. Both cases show how young people took the lead in establishing cross-national social media discussion, combating international threats, amplifying international voices and boosting online civil defense.