Taiwan marks 80th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day by highlighting threats from China

Taiwan's President Lai Ching-te delivers a speech at the commemoration ceremony of Victory in Europe at Taipei Guest House on May 8, 2025. (Johnson Lai / AP Photo)

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Taiwan marked the 80th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day on Thursday by making broad comparisons between threats to European peace and aggression from China, whose leader Xi Jinping was in Russia for commemorations as Moscow continues its invasion of Ukraine.

“Peace is priceless, and war has no winners. History has taught us that no matter the driving reason or ideology, military aggression against another country is an unjust crime that is bound to fail,” Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te told diplomats in Taipei.

“Authoritarianism and aggression lead only to slaughter, tragedy, and greater inequality,” he added.

Turning more directly to China’s threats, Lai said that both Taiwan and Europe were “now facing the threat of a new authoritarian bloc.”

“We are seeing our decades-old undersea cables, crucial for communications and cybersecurity, being sabotaged. We are seeing external interference in our elections, crucial for healthy democratic development, through the spread of misinformation and disinformation, sowing intentional division in society,” Lai said.

He added that democratic, rules-based markets are threatened by “all manner of gray-zone activities, dumping, pressures and intrusions.”

Lai’s remarks came during Taiwan’s first-ever official commemoration of VE Day and at a time when Taiwan is making a diplomatic push for closer ties with fellow democracies that nevertheless have no formal ties with the island in deference to Beijing. Former president Tsai Ing-wen is visiting Lithuania and Denmark from Friday, while Foreign Affairs Minister Lin Chia-lung is visiting the U.S. state of Texas.

China, under the Nationalist regime of former strongman Chiang Kai-shek, fought alongside the Allies in Asia during World War II and received some military assistance from the then-USSR.

China claims Taiwan as part of its territory to be annexed by force if necessary and says it has no right to international recognition. Just 12 countries, mostly small island nations in the South Pacific and Caribbean, have official diplomatic ties with Taiwan.

Lai said that those who cherish peace “cannot sit idly by and allow aggression.”

“The outbreak of the war in Europe certainly had much to do with an authoritarian regime seeking to satisfy its expansionary ambitions, but its wider spread throughout Europe had much more to do with a lack of vigilance toward acts of aggression,” he said.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian maintained Thursday that Taiwan is “part of China’s territory.”

Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party has “always used the pretext of democracy and freedom to conceal the separatist nature of Taiwan independence,” Lin said at a daily briefing in Beijing.

Putin lauds Xi in Moscow

China’s Xi, who has said Taiwan’s absorption by his authoritarian Communist regime is inevitable, was meanwhile lauded by Russian President Vladimir Putin as “our main guest” at the Victory Day festivities. The Russian leader noted that he and Xi would discuss bilateral and global issues at their summit in Moscow.

Xi is visiting for four days at a time when fighting with Ukraine, which Russia invaded more than three years ago, has closed airports in the Moscow region. The two leaders will also discuss Russia’s supply of oil and gas to China, as well as cooperation within BRICS — the bloc of developing economies that initially included Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa but has since expanded to more countries.

Putin and Xi have met over 40 times as their governments align their foreign policies to challenge the western-led liberal democratic world order.

China has offered strong diplomatic support to Moscow since the 2022 invasion and has emerged as a top market for Russian oil and gas, helping fill the Kremlin’s war chest. Russia also has relied on China as the main source of machinery and electronics to keep its drones and other parts of its military machine running after Western sanctions curtailed high-tech supplies.

Beijing hasn’t provided weapons to use in Ukraine, but has backed the Kremlin diplomatically, blaming Western threats against Russia’s security for sparking the war. China also has strongly condemned Western sanctions against Moscow, while Russia has consistently voiced support for Beijing on issues related to Taiwan.

Taiwan’s government is the inheritor to Chiang’s Nationalist regime, which battled Japanese invaders throughout the 1930s and up to the war’s end in 1945. It was ultimately driven from China by Mao Zedong’s Communist forces in 1949 and has since transitioned to a full multi-party democracy with strong but unofficial ties to the U.S., the EU, Japan and other industrialized democracies.

Chiang’s regime also provided visa-free entry for thousands of European Jews, who settled in Shanghai during the war years, saving them from the Holocaust.

Article written by Christopher Bodeen, The Associated Press