The time: November 11, 1991.

The place: The second floor conference room of the Asia-Pacific Economic Community (APEC) in Seoul, Korea.

Wu Tzu-tan, head of the international organizations department in the R.O.C. Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Hsu Ko-sheng, director general of the Board of Foreign Trade in the R.O.C. Ministry of Economic Affairs, stride out of the elevator and come face to face with Chen Chien, a senior Chinese Communist official leaving the other elevator. After shaking hands and chatting, they enter the conference room shoulder to shoulder, forming a historic scene: both sides of the Taiwan Strait "entering" an international conference at the same time.

The time: the evening of November 12, 1991.

The place: The Blue House in Seoul, Korea.

The member delegations of APEC are attending a state dinner hosted by President Roh Tae Woo--the delegates from Taiwan, the mainland and Hong Kong being no exception. Amid all the glitter and protocol, U.S. Secretary of State James Baker makes a special point of going over and shaking hands with Vincent C. Siew, the leader of the R.O.C. delegation, and welcoming us as members.

Stepping Up in the World: What with lengthy media coverage of these and similar events, the global perspective of Chinese people has been cranked up another notch, and APEC, GATT and other international organizations have become a popular new after-dinner topic.

And no wonder the events have received so much media attention. APEC is the highest level--and the most politically oriented--international organization that we have joined since 1971, when the R.O.C. withdrew from the United Nations.

"The biggest significance of joining APEC lies in setting up formal communication channels with ministers and high-level officials in other countries," Minister of Economic Affairs Vincent C. Siew said on his return to Taiwan. "From now on, we can solve a lot of problems just by making a phone call."

Our efforts to join the world economic organization GATT (the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) have also borne fruit. The application, submitted last year, has won the open support of the United States, South Korea, France and many other countries.

Outside the glare of the media, in April we attended the Inter-American Development Bank as an observer and joined the World Science Foundation under the name Republic of China. In June we joined the Central American Bank for Economic Integration under the name Republic of China as well. And in September we set up a special fund with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development under the name "Taipei China"--all major successes in our efforts to join global and regional organizations.

Raising the Nation's Status: The main significance of being a member of an international organization lies in communicating with other countries, in making decisions with them and in sharing information. But it is even more significant for us since we were forced out of the United Nations by the Chinese Communists and still lack formal diplomatic relations with most members of the world community.

"As far as political significance is concerned, membership in international organizations provides us with a channel for formal contacts with many important countries, and it has a very positive effect on raising our international status and increasing our substantive relations with other countries," Minister Siew says. "As for economics, membership in world economic and trade organizations allows us to work through multilateral channels and international arbitration to gain reasonable treatment and ensure our economic interests, avoiding bilateral consultations, where we're often at a disadvantage because the other side is too strong."

In fact, being excluded from international organizations has hampered us in many ways for a long time. We're not a member of the Universal Postal Union, for instance, so we have to go through roundabout channels to find out how to calculate international postal rates instead.

"Even when a simple letter is sent to another country, we're not sure how to figure out which side is charged what," Fredrick F. Chien, minister of foreign affairs, cites a simple example to illustrate the drawbacks of not being a member in international organizations. "If figuring the cost of a stamp is such a headache, imagine the problems caused by not being a member of civil aviation and maritime organizations in charge of international shipping and transportation."

The NT Talks: According to figures of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Republic of China is currently a member of 769 international organizations, most of them nonpolitical in nature, like International Criminal Police Organization and the International Olympics Committee. Just 10 of them are officially governmental.

"Taking part in government-sponsored international organizations is important, but it's not hard to understand why we didn't do very well at it in the past," says Pao Tzung-ho, a specialist in international politics.

As for international organizations that are political in nature and affiliated with the United Nations, as long as mainland China is a member or has applied to join, we're locked out cold regardless of what name we go by, since the mainland is one of the five permanent members of the Security Council.

As for economic organizations, we've long been a trade powerhouse, "but very few countries supported us, because we used to have high tariffs and low purchasing power, and they'd always come up on the short end of the stick in dealing with us," Andrew C. Tsuei, chairman of the Association for East Europe Trade Promotion, points out.

Today, Taiwan has changed from a pure supplier of goods to an international marketplace and a provider of capital. Our per capita GNP of US$8,000, our vast foreign exchange reserves--the largest in the world -- and our multibillion-dollar Six-Year National Development Plan have made countries around the world start to see us with different eyes.

Casper Shih, general manager of the China Productivity Center, puts it bluntly: "We want the NT dollar to speak for Taiwan."

He says that our huge foreign exchange reserves are something countries around the world desperately covet. We're the biggest money holder in the world right now, and we should take advantage of this to leap onto the world stage and play a major role.

A Newspaper Ad Packed with Punch: We're also becoming more and more adept at employing strategies to win international support. To win broader backing from the American public, for instance, the government took out a series of ads in major North American newspapers like the New York Times to explain its desire to join GATT.

The ads have been described as "packed with punch." Isn't it ridiculous, they ask, that a country that possesses the world's largest foreign exchange reserves--the second largest foreign investor in Asia, the world's 13th largest trading nation [note: it was 15th in 1990] and America's sixth largest trading partner--isn't a member of GATT? It points out that Taiwan has a free market economy, plans to enter as a customs territory rather than a country, and meets all the necessary requirements--all the obstacles come from mainland China, which isn't even qualified to join. Who's making all the trouble? Why should the U.S. and the rest of the world dillydally about this any more? Isn't it all due to the pigheadedness of the Chinese Communists?

This aggressive approach has had powerful effects. Beyond the success in the U.S., the business community in Europe has been calling louder and louder on its governments to support our entrance in GATT and other international organizations.

In trying to join scientific, medical, cultural, athletic, academic and other nongovernmental organizations, we used to have a lot of problems in the past because of our name.

Fredrick Chien says that when he took over the Ministry of Foreign Affairs a year ago, we were caught in the dilemma of choosing between "the real thing without the name, or the name without the real thing"--it was very hard to get both at the same time.

Fighting Battles We're Sure of Winning: Leaders in the private sector see it pretty much the same say. "We aren't happy with all the 'weird names' for us, but if we don't belong to international organizations, we don't have a forum to make our point. We can't seek to change things unless we're on the inside," says Koo Chen-fu, chairman of the National Association of Industry and Commerce.

In this regard, even some members of the opposition party back him up. "As long as we can return to the U.N., I'm not opposed to using either name--Taiwan or the R.O.C.--and I'd be happy to see it happen," says Annette Lu, director of the Democratic Progressive Party's Coalition for Democracy.

Returning to the most important international organization of all--the United Nations--is a common desire of the government and the public.

When the General Assembly convened on September 17th, Lu led a group called the "Alliance for the Promotion of U.N. Membership for Taiwan" in a protest outside the U.N. building shouting "Open the U.N. to Taiwan!"

As for the government, Premier Hao Pei-tsun publicly stated that returning to the United Nations is the ultimate objective of our taking part in global and regional organizations. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has set up a United Nations section in its department of international organizations that is assembling and putting together information on the United Nations so we'll be prepared to return when the time comes.

"But our standpoint on joining international organizations at the present stage is still to give priority consideration to regional, economic and trade, and functional organizations," Fredrick Chien says. Faced with our difficult international circumstances, we have to avoid battles we're not sure of winning as much as possible to avoid wasting limited resources. The major international organizations that we belong to at present, such as the Asian Development Bank, the Pacific Basin Economic Council, Pacific Economic Cooperation Council and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings, all meet one of the three criteria he mentioned.

Top Priority on Economics and Trade: The private sector agrees that joining economic and trade organizations is a more realistic approach for us right now.

Bert J. Lim, president the World Economics Society, believes that with its current industrial structure, Taiwan's economy requires profits from sales and financial services as well as from manufacturing and to do that we have to take part in international organizations and exchange more information with other countries.

Koo Chen-fu, who has long been known as an "ambassador of trade" holds a similar view: "The main global economic organizations that we're fighting to join at present now are GATT, which regulates the world's free trading system; the International Monetary Fund, which regulates the world's financial system; the World Bank, which assists in the development of developing countries; and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which is made up of the world's leading industrialized countries."

He specially emphasizes we should work on joining international financial organizations. "Even if we can't join the International Monetary Fund right now, which is affiliated with the U.N., we can still lend it money, so at least we'll be able to attend their board meetings later."

It's an approach worth considering. Actually, the major countries of the world all support us in joining international economic and trade organizations--first, because Taiwan is an indispensable link in the world economy, and "another reason, frankly speaking, is they hope we'll pay back the international community by bearing duties and responsibilities commensurate with the rights we'll enjoy and our growth," says Yeh Wan-an, vice chairman of the Council for Economic Planning and Development.

That's why the United States, Japan and other leading members of GATT have hinted to us that it would be easier for us to win support if we applied to join as a "developed country."

Gearing Up in Preparation: With GATT in mind, the previous minister of economic affairs, Chen Li-an (now minister of defense), organized an ad hoc group of high-level officials from the Ministries of Finance and Economic Affairs to draft a four-year timetable for lowering tariffs. "The ad justments will be completed at the end of next year, and you'll start seeing results the year after that," says Lin Yung-lo, head of the international tariffs section in the Ministry of Finance.

In fact, the new spirit for lower tariffs has already delivered a blow to many local industries. The lowering of the tariff for imports of small cars from 40 percent to 30 percent, for instance, has set off tremors in the domestic car market. Automakers have slashed prices and are howling with pain, but most people are tickled pink, and when they get together, the talk often revolves around trade-ins and new models.

Besides the shock to protected industries, some of our ways of doing things that are out of line with international standards also need to be revised. The copyright law currently in effect here, for instance, provides protection to local authors for works as soon as they are completed, but it requires foreigners--Americans are an exception--to register their works first. This sort of discrepancy in treatment clearly violates GATT's fair trade principles.

Then again, our patent protections are shorter in term and narrower in scope than those of the United States, Japan, Britain, Germany and other advanced countries.

"Once we join GATT, the laws and regulations related to these copyright and patent problems will have to be revised, and we'll have to be even more careful about pirating and unauthorized translations," says Tsai Ying-wen, a law professor at National Chengchi University. Viewed from another angle, however, our own works and products will receive greater protection around the world on the basis of reciprocity.

Next Target Montreal: "The government should do better at letting scholars and the general public know what effect joining international organizations will have on the economy and how the system should be improved," Koo Chen-fu says. He thinks the focus on joining international organizations should be put back on its substantive economic meaning instead of its "political" significance.

That's even more true for the next organization we're hoping to join -- the Montreal Protocol. To prevent the deterioration of the ozone layer and the exacerbation of the greenhouse effect, the countries of the world were invited by the United Nations to sign a protocol in Montreal in 1987 agreeing to fix their consumption of fluorocarbon compounds at 1986 levels by July 1, 1989, and to completely ban the use of fluorocarbon compounds by the year 2000. Any nation that violates the regulations is subject to economic sanctions by the signer countries.

As a a member of the international community, the Republic of China has constantly sought to become a signer of the Montreal Protocol and work in common to protect the earth's environment. But the protocol clearly stipulates that the signers must be "nations" in status, and the Chinese Communists, who are a signer, have managed to keep us excluded.

The protocol's requirements toward nonsignatory countries are even stricter. It bans the import of fluorocarbon products manufactured by non-signing countries as of 1990, which cost us NT$300 to $400 million last year alone.

NT$2OO Billion Losses: Two years later, the ban will extend to all products made by nonsigning countries containing fluorocarbon compounds, such as refrigeration equipment and so forth. At that time, our losses in exports will reach NT$1 to $1.2 billion.

Four years later, any product in which fluorocarbon compounds are used in the manufacturing process, such as cleaning fluid for electronic equipment, foam packaging for computers and freeze packaging for foods, will fall under the ban for nonsigning countries--five years earlier than the signers require of themselves. Given this unfair treatment, our losses are estimated to reach NT$200 billion. Vice Economics Minister Chien Ping-kun indicates that unless we can join the Montreal Protocol or be treated as a signer country, our trade losses will be no small matter.

The Ministry of Economic Affairs, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Environmental Protection Administration and the Industrial Technology Research Institute have decided to form a delegation to attend the U.N.-sponsored "Intergovernmental Negotiations Committee for a Framework Convention on Climatic Change" to be held in Geneva December 9 to 20. "We hope to win the support of other countries in letting us join the protocol" Chiang says.

Opening International Doors: In the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, situated on a quiet section of Chieh Shou Rd., the phones in the international organizations department are constantly ringing, the staff is busily poring through documents, and officials involved in major diplomatic initiatives are streaming in and out, swinging open the thick wooden door. Along with the rhythm of that door, we've been opening the doors to international organizations one after another.

[Picture Caption]

Economic clout is our greatest asset for returning to international organizations. Shown here is a computer show at the Taipei World Trade Center. (photo by Pu Hua-chih)

At the APEC conference in Seoul, the Thai foreign minister, Arsa Sarasin(right), extended his compliments to Minister of Economic Affairs Vincent C. Siew, welcoming u s as a member. (photo by Tsai Wen-hsiang)

Integrating our financial system with the rest of the world's helps to elevate the power of our economy as a whole. (photo by Arthur Cheng)

The huge budget for the Six-Year National Development Plan has attracted the interest of countries around the world and earned us a lot of international support.

Vice President Li Yuan-zu (fourth from right) and Minister of Foreign Affairs Fredrick F. Chien (second from right) carry out consultations in Costa Rica. (photo by Yeh Ming-yuan)

Foreign Minister Fredrick Chien says, "Our priority in joining international organizations is on regional, economic and trade, and functional type organizations."

The original charter of the United Nations still shows the signatures of the R.O.C. representatives.

The "Let Taiwan Join the U.N." demonstration held in New York hoped to win international support for our membership in the United Nations. (photo courtesy of the Coalition for Democracy).

The R.O.C. took out ads in major publications in the U.S. and Canada cal ling for support for our membership in GATT.

Economic clout is our greatest asset for returning to international organizations. Shown here is a computer show at the Taipei World Trade Center. （photo by Pu Hua-chih）

At the APEC conference in Seoul, the Thai foreign minister, Arsa Sarasin（right）, extended his compliments to Minister of Economic Affairs Vincent C. Siew, welcoming u s as a member. （photo by Tsai Wen-hsiang）

Integrating our financial system with the rest of the world's helps to elevate the power of our economy as a whole. （photo by Arthur Cheng）

The huge budget for the Six-Year National Development Plan has attracted the interest of countries around the world and earned us a lot of international support.

Vice President Li Yuan-zu （fourth from right） and Minister of Foreign Affairs Fredrick F. Chien （second from right） carry out consultations in Costa Rica. （photo by Yeh Ming-yuan）

Foreign Minister Fredrick Chien says, "Our priority in joining international organizations is on regional, economic and trade, and functional type organizations.".

The original charter of the United Nations still shows the signatures of the R.O.C. representatives.

The "Let Taiwan Join the U.N." demonstration held in New York hoped to win international support for our membership in the United Nations. （photo courtesy of the Coalition for Democracy）.

The R.O.C. took out ads in major publications in the U.S. and Canada cal ling for support for our membership in GATT.