TAIPEI - Taiwan's Foreign Minister James Huang said he hoped the United States would "not dance to Beijing's tune" after the White House criticised the island's plan to hold a referendum on UN membership.
In an interview with AFP Huang said he wanted the US, the island's major ally and arms supplier, to take a broader view of Taiwan's bid to join the United Nations.
"I hope they would not dance to Beijing's tune," he said, adding UN membership was a natural outcome of Taiwan's democratic evolution over more than two decades and aspired to by the island's 23 million people.
"I know our friends in the US State Department are busy dealing with Iraq and Iran," he said. "But I still would like them to look at our UN efforts and the referendum from a broader perspective rather than from Beijing's point of view."
Senior White House official Dennis Wilder said Thursday that the proposed referendum unnecessarily increased tension with China, which claims Taiwan, since the island was not a state and so could not become a UN member.
The UN General Assembly will discuss Taiwan's membership application later this month. President Chen Shui-bian plans to hold a referendum on the issue alongside either parliamentary or presidential elections due next year.
Taiwan, under its official name the Republic of China, lost its UN seat to China in 1971. Beijing has repeatedly blocked its efforts to rejoin as it opposes Taiwanese independence.
China and Taiwan split in 1949 after a civil war. Last week US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte warned the referendum was a "a provocative step" toward declaring full independence.
But Huang said that the ruling Democratic Progressive Party's plan had "nothing to do with Taiwan's independence" and was not an attempt "to alter the status quo."
"Taiwan is already a sovereign state," he argued.
Huang also called Washington's attention to the contrast between Taiwan's often heated democracy and China's authoritarian Communist rulers.
"Democracy is the most important element to stabilise Asia, isn't it? If now our American friends say this is not so, then I have nothing to say," he said.
"If the United States does not feel Taiwan's democracy is important, nor does it think Taiwan's democracy would help in China's democratisation, then I have nothing further to say.
"But then again, democracy is crucial in the region. The world is wary of China's rise and its military build-up because China is not a democracy," he added.
President Chen has said he plans to press ahead with the referendum despite the opposition from Washington and Beijing.
The US "cannot ask Taiwan to be a democratic country but forbid it to hold a referendum ... the US cannot draw a red line on Taiwan's democracy but shift it back and forth," he has said.
President George W. Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao would likely discuss the Taiwan issue when they meet at the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Australia, officials have said.
Washington switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979.
09/02/2007 04:29 GMT