Panda power to lower great wall of distrust

China is offering cultural icons, pandas No 16 (left) and No 19, to Taiwan as a token of peace. Picture / Reuters

Unusually for diplomats given the task of easing tensions between the might of China and the island of Taiwan, No 16 and No 19 are complete newcomers to international relations.

Barely a year old, they are setting off on a mission to foster goodwill between the two peoples, a task that has, so far, defeated the international community. But they are uniquely qualified for the challenge, in so much as they are pandas.

Giant pandas, China's cultural icon, are cute, cuddly and popular. China has picked out two yearling pandas, a female called No 16 and a male called No 19, from the Wolong Nature Reserve in Sichuan province, and the docile beasts have been offered to Taiwan as a carefully weighted token of goodwill. Panda diplomacy is back in a big way.

To make sure they have no problems adjusting to life on the island that mainland China considers a renegade province, the pandas' keepers have started giving them lessons in understanding the Taiwanese dialect of Chinese, Minnanhua, piping in songs and radio shows from the island.

"After the state forestry bureau announced the pandas would be sent to Taiwan, workers at the centre became a little worried. To help them to get used to their future language environment more quickly, two of the workers started to study Minnan dialect and sing Minnan songs," said Wolong director, Li Desheng.

Despite the cheerful tone of this latest round of political pandas, there is a hard political aspect to the offer, and Beijing has accompanied the gesture with regular broadsides against Taiwan's President, Chen Shui-bian, accusing him of cranking up cross-Strait tensions by supporting formal independence.

A national emblem that brings good luck, the panda is a potent symbol in China, where they are called da xiong mao (big bear cat) and people in Taiwan are keen to welcome the bears.

But Taiwan's leaders are furious at being put into a position where they will have to accept the popular pandas.

Beijing has a history of using the animals to win diplomatic points. According to ancient records, Tang-Dynasty Empress Wu Zetian (624 to 705) presented two pandas to the Japanese court.

Chairman Mao Zedong sent Richard Nixon a pair in 1972. Pandas became the public face of the blossoming relationship between the two countries.

From 1958 to 1982, China sent 23 pandas to nine different countries, including the Soviet Union, North Korea and France. The panda gifts were becoming so common that conservationists began to complain.

The embodiment of non-aggression, the panda earned its diplomatic credentials as the traditional image of a giant teddy bear lumbering about harming no one.

Though generally shy, cheerful pandas will often allow people to sit and feed them apples at the Wolong reserve, which is leading the drive to keep pandas from dying out.

These days, panda diplomacy is more complicated than it used to be. There are only 1590 pandas in the wild and 180 in China's five major breeding facilities, which makes them one of the world's most endangered species.

Zoos abroad have to pledge to keep the bears well and pay more than $1.3 million a year to keep the pandas for 10 years. After that, the pandas go back to China to be reintroduced into the wild or be put into Chinese zoos.

When Washington was given Tian Tian and Mei Xiang in 2000, as replacements for its original pandas, they were on a 10-year loan. Private donors paid $26 million for the privilege.

They are famously poor breeders - they spend most of the year on their own, except during a three-month mating season which begins in March.

Male pandas suffer from a chronic lack of sex drive - more than 60 per cent of male pandas in captivity show no sexual desire at all, and only one tenth of them will mate naturally.

Keepers have used videos of mating pairs in the hope that panda porn will help the bears get a bit frisky.

The female is fertile for just a few days each year, and the girls like to play hard-to-get.

Just like everyone else in China, pandas follow a one-child policy. Females generally give birth to just one cub after a pregnancy lasting about 160 days and the cub weighs about as much as an apple when it is born.

When two cubs are born, the mother will often abandon one or crush it in its sleep as she is not equipped to care for two.

The names of the bears going to Taiwan will be chosen in a highly public competition designed to keep the Taiwan question high on people's minds on the mainland.

Whether they are accepted remains up to Chen but if they do cross the Strait, they will come complete with a hardline, anti-independence message.

Beijing and Taipei have been fierce rivals since they split after the civil war in 1949, when the losing Kuomingtang (KMT) forces under Chiang Kai-shek fled to Taiwan, considered a renegade province by China.

But Chen has domestic problems. He is fighting to boost his administration's flagging fortunes since Prime Minister Frank Hsieh quit, after a poor showing in local elections last month and plummeting approval ratings over his resistance to forging closer ties with the mainland.

China insists that Taiwan must eventually be reunified with the mainland and it has introduced controversial legislation, which it says allows it to take Taiwan by force if necessary.

Panda diplomacy, in this case, is backed with hundreds of missiles pointed at Taiwan across the 160km channel that divides China and Taiwan. The strait is potentially one of the most explosive hotspots in Asia. The United States has pledged to back Taiwan if China should invade.

In his New Year's address, Chen warned Taiwan's economy should not be too dependent on China - comments widely read as a sign of tighter economic policy towards the mainland. The message irritated business leaders on the island who want better ties to China. And it infuriated Beijing.

"Anyone who makes an enemy of his own people and compatriots will certainly reap a bitter harvest," warned Li Weiyi of China's Taiwan Affairs Office.

In recent months, a number of President Chen's rivals have visited the mainland, including KMT leader Lien Chan, and China has been keen to build on these propaganda gains by offering a brace of bears.

In an article headlined "Peaceful pandas versus bellicose Chen", the China Daily used the pandas as a platform to attack President Chen.

"Stubborn as he is, Chen has to face the reality: he may be able to block the entry of the panda couple but he cannot stop the Taiwanese people's love for the pandas, or aspirations for cross-Straits peace and stability," the editorial ran.

The Taiwanese concede they may have to take the pandas but they are not happy.

"It looks like they insisted on sending them to us, and we have no choice but to accept them," said Joseph Wu, the cabinet official in charge of relations with the mainland. "It shows severe disrespect to us."

Taipei will accept the pandas only if China agrees to the rules of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, and allows Taiwan to sign an agreement as an "importing country".

The mainlanders say the transfer of the pandas does not fall under the remit of the convention, as donating the pandas would not be an international transfer, as Taiwan is part of China.

This week Li Yuchen, the winner of the popular TV programme Supergirl, the Chinese version of Pop Idol, sponsored a panda at Wolong and attracted so many screaming fans that the panda fainted with shock.

Diplomats they may be, but they are uncomfortable with celebrity.

- INDEPENDENT