Juno News - This is why you should care about Hong Kong and Taiwan

00:00:00.000 During the pandemic, Taiwan and Hong Kong have both been in the news a great deal. Now, some

00:00:10.900 may see these in passing headlines and wonder, well, why should I care about this country or

00:00:15.180 that country relative to my own concerns, the concerns within my own border? Fair point,

00:00:20.220 fair question. But I think these two countries in particular are very important for a couple

00:00:25.660 of reasons. They are the beachheads for all that is good when it comes to liberty, freedom,

00:00:32.180 and democracy. They are also the bulwarks for the rest of the world, the freedom-loving world,

00:00:36.820 to defend itself from the rise of China, the rising global superpower that would like to

00:00:42.200 really export its vision of the world, its vision of communism, as broadly as they can. And that

00:00:47.780 includes swallowing up these regions that they contend are theirs. Taiwan, Hong Kong, Tibet,

00:00:52.220 the South China Sea, various other sundry pieces of land. And we cannot allow that to happen. Both

00:00:57.840 Taiwan and Hong Kong, freedom-loving countries, freedom-loving peoples. And I will say in many

00:01:03.440 respects, they are quite similar to Canada, to some degree, population-wise, at least when it comes

00:01:09.100 to Taiwan, in terms of just the general sort of middle-class culture of regular folks who believe

00:01:14.980 in the rule of law, believe in family, believe in strong society. We have a lot of similarities there,

00:01:19.800 and the good guys have to stick together. Now, for a long time now, China has considered Taiwan

00:01:26.400 this sort of renegade province. When it comes to Hong Kong, well, they sort of brought them back

00:01:30.980 into the fold in 1997, and then they signed a deal saying that, okay, we're going to leave you alone

00:01:36.480 until 2047, and until then, we're going to have two systems. Well, they're violating that more and

00:01:41.900 more now. Hong Kong has this basic law that more or less enshrines that democracy gets to continue,

00:01:47.060 and freedom gets to continue, at least in the interim. Well, China not following that anymore.

00:01:52.840 They are actually really putting strong words up against Hong Kong and Taiwan right now, because

00:01:57.520 during the pandemic, the world is very busy dealing with its own issues. Every country has their own

00:02:03.040 concerns, and of course, you've got to put your own country first in all of this, but these are two

00:02:07.220 countries that they are really feeling the wrath of China and China's opportunism right now. There are

00:02:13.220 many different fronts in which Canada has to be wary of China. We have to be concerned about them. We

00:02:17.660 have to watch our own backs on it, but the reason that standing up for Taiwan and Hong Kong matters

00:02:22.580 so much is because they are the buffer zone. Once they go, what's to stop China then from bullying

00:02:27.500 other regions even more and more? So they matter because they're good people, because those countries

00:02:32.240 matter inherently, intrinsically, and because, like I said, they're the beachheads. I mean, if China is able

00:02:37.900 to make their aggression against them, that's a problem for the rest of the freedom-loving world.

Juno News - May 30, 2020