When was taiwan founded

The authorities in Beijing have never exercised sovereignty over Taiwan or other islands administered by the ROC.

Historical Timeline. Taiwan continues to experience visits by small numbers of Chinese merchants, fishermen and pirates. The Dutch East India Company establishes a base in southwestern Taiwan, initiating a transformation in aboriginal grain production practices and employing Chinese laborers to work on its rice and sugar plantations.

Spanish adventurers establish bases in northern Taiwan but are ousted by the Dutch in Fleeing the Manchurian conquest of the Ming dynasty , Ming loyalists under Zheng Cheng-gong, or Koxinga, drive out the Dutch from Taiwan and establish authority over the island.

Following defeat in the First Sino-Japanese War , the Qing government signs the Treaty of Shimonoseki, by which it cedes sovereignty over Taiwan to Japan, which rules the island until The ROC, U. In March and the following months, ROC troops dispatched from China suppress a large-scale uprising of Taiwan residents sparked by the February 28 Incident. This begins the period of White Terror that lasts until when the Temporary Provisions are lifted.

All treaties, conventions and agreements concluded before Dec. The creation of such zones propels Taiwan toward becoming a developed nation, setting a paradigm for other countries to follow. The nine-year compulsory education system is launched at a time when fewer than nine countries globally have compulsory education systems of this length or more.

On Oct. Migration from the Chinese mainland to the island was prohibited, but grinding poverty and food shortages meant thousands of peasants in nearby Fujian a mainland Chinese province ignored this rule and sought better lives in Taiwan.

However, because the government and judicial systems were thoroughly corrupt, the island was often lawless. Banditry was widespread; immigrants from different parts of Fujian fought each other and the aborigines over land and water rights.

Intermarriage between Fujianese and Hakka men and aboriginal women was very common, and is one reason why the lowland tribes were quickly assimilated.

Studies of Taiwanese DNA have found most people have aboriginal blood in their veins. In the second half of the 19th century Taiwan started to attract Western and Japanese interest for economic and strategic reasons.

In , when the French were fighting with China over Vietnam, French soldiers occupied Keelung and the Penghu islands. Because of these incursions, the imperial court in Beijing was forced to pay proper attention to Taiwan, commissioning forts and a railway. Also, Taiwan was finally upgraded to a province in its own right; before , it had been treated as part of Fujian.

Some Taiwanese resisted the takeover, and the Japanese Army spent six months, and lost thousands of men, crushing local guerilla forces. Most of the Japanese deaths were the result of disease, not bullet wounds. In the first 20 years of Japanese rule, great improvements were made in public health.

Opium addiction was curbed. Roads were built and the railway network was expanded. However, Japanese control of natural resources such as coal and forests in the latter, camphor was an especially valuable commodity led to resentment. The indigenous population had additional grievances: The colonial authorities took away their guns and ancestral lands, and forced tribespeople to provide labour for government projects.

His warriors slaughtered Japanese citizens at a school and carried out hit-and-run attacks on Japanese Army units and pro-Japanese aborigines. Thousands of Allied prisoners-of-war were held in POW camps in Taiwan; hundreds died as a result of malnutrition and overwork. Japanese-era public buildings are landmarks in Taipei and elsewhere, and there is a strong attachment to Japanese cuisine, culture and fashion.

And in , when Taiwan elected Chen Shui-bian as president, Beijing was alarmed. Mr Chen had openly backed "independence". A year after Mr Chen was re-elected in , China passed a so-called anti-secession law, stating China's right to use "non-peaceful means" against Taiwan if it tried to "secede" from China. Mr Chen was succeeded by Ma Ying-jeou, who, after taking office in , sought to improve relations with China through economic agreements.

Eight years later, in , Taiwan's current president Tsai Ing-wen was elected. Despite the lack of formal ties, the US has pledged to supply Taiwan with defensive weapons and has stressed any attack by China would cause "grave concern".

Throughout , China stepped up pressure on international companies, forcing them to list Taiwan as a part of China on their websites and threatening to block them for doing business in China if they failed to comply. Ms Tsai won a second term in By that time Hong Kong had seen months of unrest, with protesters demonstrating against the mainland's increasing influence - a development many in Taiwan were watching closely.

Later that year, China's implementation of a national security law in Hong Kong was widely seen as yet another sign that Beijing was becoming more assertive in the region.

At the same time, the US has been intensifying its outreach to Taiwan and reassuring Taipei of its continued support. Last September, Washington sent the highest-level state department official in decades to visit the island. Beijing strongly criticised the meeting, warning the US "not to send any wrong signals to 'Taiwan independence' elements to avoid severe damage to China-US relations".

During the controversial visit, China conducted a live-fire military exercise in the waterway that separates the island from the mainland. This year, President Joe Biden's administration has said its commitment to Taiwan is "rock solid". In the first few days of Mr Biden's presidency, Taiwan reported a "large incursion" by Chinese warplanes over two days.

Then on 12 April, the Taiwanese government said China flew the largest number of military jets into its air defence zone for a year.

There is disagreement and confusion about what Taiwan is. China regards Taiwan as a breakaway province which it has vowed to retake, by force if necessary. But Taiwan's leaders say it is clearly much more than a province, arguing that it is a sovereign state. It has its own constitution, democratically-elected leaders, and about , active troops in its armed forces.

Chiang Kai-shek's Republic of China ROC government, which fled the mainland to Taiwan in , at first claimed to represent the whole of China, which it intended to re-occupy. Since then the number of countries that recognise the ROC government diplomatically has fallen drastically to about Given the huge divide between these two positions, most other countries seem happy to accept the current ambiguity, whereby Taiwan has virtually all of the characteristics of an independent state, even if its legal status remains unclear.