Kinmen, Taiwan – On the sandy shores of Taiwan, Liu Xi Jiu places on his goggles as he prepares to run throughout probably the most harmful stretches of water on the planet.
Initially from Beijing, he’s competing in the one occasion of its form, a seven-kilometer (4.3-mile) swim race throughout a geopolitical flashpoint, from Taiwan’s Kinmen Islands to town of Xiamen on China’s east coast.
Round them, 200 athletes from China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau chortle and joke as they heat up. Forward of them, past the rows of anti-invasion spikes that line Kinmen’s golden seashores, Xiamen’s signature skyscrapers glisten within the morning solar.
However the heat climate and sense of pleasant competitors masks more and more tense relations throughout the strait separating democratic Taiwan from China, which claims the island as its personal.
The swimmers, who’re getting ready for the gruelling 90-minute crossing, hope their camaraderie can serve for instance for smoother exchanges in these uneven waters.
Kinmen and its residents have all the time had an in depth relationship with China, Wu Zeng Yun, government director of the Kinmen-Matsu Joint Service Centre, informed Al Jazeera.
Though Wu’s office now features as a neighborhood department of Taiwan’s central authorities, the constructing nonetheless bears the title of the Fujian Provincial Authorities. The characters, emblazoned in gold above the imposing entrance, are a reminder of the time when Kinmen was a part of China’s Fujian province.
“Up to now, my uncles did enterprise in Tong’an on the mainland,” Wu mentioned, referring to the historic district seen throughout the water from exterior his workplace.
“It was a shared dwelling space,” he added. “You simply needed to go to the dock, board a ship to Tong’an and pay the fare.”
However after the top of the Chinese language civil conflict in 1949, every thing modified. Confronted with defeat by the hands of the communists, the Nationalist authorities of the Republic of China fled Beijing and settled in Taiwan. It additionally retained management of the Kinmen Islands, greater than 300 kilometres from Taipei.
The island’s residents had been minimize off from the province they had been as soon as a part of and shortly discovered themselves on the entrance traces of a political battle between Taipei and Beijing that at occasions erupted into violence.
As China recurrently bombed the island till 1979, residents recall hiding in bunkers across the island, taking cowl as bombs fell on their villages.
China reaffirmed its willingness to make use of drive to take management of Taiwan, which it considers its territory, in a white paper printed in 2022. The Taipei authorities says Taiwan’s individuals needs to be those to resolve its future.
Rising tensions
Standing on the ferry terminal at Kinmen’s Shuitou Pier, lawmaker Chen Yu Jen mentioned her father was aboard one of many first ships that reconnected Kinmen with China in 2001.
On the time, there have been hopes that such connections might assist enhance relations between Taipei and Beijing, however as Chen heads to the gate, getting ready to comply with in his father’s footsteps, that hope has but to materialize.
In mid-February, Kinmen was once more on the centre of tensions between the 2 sides of the strait after a confrontation between the Taiwanese coast guard and a Chinese language boat that was caught fishing in its waters. Two of the fishermen died.
To make issues worse, the Chinese language ship was discovered to have capsized after colliding with the Taiwanese vessel, a incontrovertible fact that Taipei had initially omitted in its account of the incident.
In response, the Chinese language Coast Guard (CCG), not directly below the command of Beijing’s Central Army Fee, stepped up its presence within the area.
Searching over the turbulent waters from his small boat, native fisherman and enterprise proprietor Lu Wen Shiung says the fishing group has already felt the impression.
“When relations between the 2 sides of the strait had been much less tense, we had good relations with coastal fishermen from the mainland,” he recalled. “If the mainland fishermen had a superb catch, they shared it with us.”
However as GCC ships have begun recurrently crossing Kinmen’s territorial waters, a line that was broadly revered till February, Lu now faces strain from Chinese language vessels whilst his ship approaches Kinmen’s shores.
“The actions of the Chinese language Coast Guard have modified considerably. They now continuously patrol our waters,” Lu mentioned.
In an unprecedented transfer, the GCC even boarded a Taiwanese vacationer boat in February. Three months later, it introduced a sequence of navy workout routines in Kinmen for the primary time.
“Each time we exit to sea, we encounter them,” mentioned fisherman Lu, referring to the CCG. “This yr, they’ve already chased me 3 times.”
In early July, a Taiwanese fishing boat with two Taiwanese and three Indonesian residents on board was additionally seized by the Chinese language Coast Guard and brought ashore, accused of violating a summer season fishing ban. The boat’s captain stays below investigation, however the crew was launched this week.
“Some fishermen working close by are nervous that any misstep might consequence of their boat being detained,” Kinmen County Councillor Tung Sen Pao informed Al Jazeera.
Whereas analysts say China’s incursions are a part of Beijing’s “grey zone” ways to exert strain on Taipei, some in Kinmen fear concerning the potential threat of escalation and unintended battle.
Recognition and respect for Kinmen’s restricted waters are “essential to sustaining peace,” mentioned Wu of the Kinmen-Matsu Joint Service Heart. “If the mainland unilaterally denies them, it will increase the danger of battle.”
“If border models, coast guards and coastal police conflict throughout their duties… it might result in pointless disputes and accidents, which might set off navy conflicts, which might be detrimental to either side,” mentioned Councillor Tung.
Optimistic points
Regardless of the anger attributable to the fishermen’s deaths, some are hopeful that Kinmen can as soon as once more develop into a spot of cross-strait collaboration, noting a degree of “goodwill” between the native governments on the island and in Xiamen.
On July 30, Taipei’s Straits Trade Basis (SEF), a semi-official group tasked with selling cross-strait cooperation, and its Chinese language counterparts lastly reached an settlement that will repatriate again to the mainland the our bodies of the Chinese language fishermen whose deaths sparked the preliminary spike in tensions in February.
Now that the lads’s our bodies have returned to China, some hope tensions will ease.
A former Taiwanese soldier, detained in March after his ship ran aground in Chinese language waters, was additionally launched this month.
Again on Kinmen seaside, Chinese language swimmer Liu stands shoulder to shoulder together with his Taiwanese opponents, searching in the direction of the Chinese language coast.
For him and lots of different Chinese language swimmers, the race marks their first participation in Taiwan.
Just like the competitors organisers, the swimmers hope the race will serve for instance of what may be achieved by way of cooperation and of the diplomatic progress already made.
“Such sporting occasions assist foster ties between individuals,” he mentioned. “I hope either side can resolve points peacefully.”
Listening to the sound of the beginning horn, he dives headfirst into the waves, dashing by way of the water on his technique to Xiamen.
“Up to now, the ocean was a battlefield between Kinmen and Xiamen. They fought one another with bullets,” recalled Ms. Chen. When she was a baby, Kinmen’s shores had been strictly off-limits, reserved for navy functions.
“Now this sea is a spot of peace. Individuals can swim throughout it and again,” he mentioned.
