Recently, a news story surrounding Harvard University appeared in the media. Two Chinese delegate students whom took part in Harvard's model United Nations were ousted from the event after creating a protest fracas over Taiwan being referred to as a country. They noticed that the list of participants was by country, with Taiwan included. They demanded that the issue be resolved by altering "country" to "country or region". After a day of the open and disruptive protests, they were removed from the event by security and threatened with police action.
Ruth Hagen, the secretary of the 2015 UN of Harvard, issued an email to the Chinese delegation on January 31, explaining to them that "The inclusion of Taiwan is not meant as a political statement, nor does that listing represent the views of the Harvard International Relations Council." The offered stickers saying "country of region" to be applied to their own handbooks, but they were not satisfied. The Chinese delegation believed that they were owed an apology. In the past, they did not have Taiwan listed as a country in 2013. But this year, both Hong Kong and Taiwan were listed as countries. Many would probably wonder why the fuss over this. They would probably be asking "Is Taiwan not a country?" Not to the Chinese.
Since the Chinese Civil War in 1949, China and Taiwan, known officially as the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC) respectively, have been separate nations. However, the PRC still holds the claim of Taiwan as being apart of their country. The PRC has even threatened to use force against the ROC should they attempt to move any closer to independence. On the flipside, Taiwanese citizens do not consider themselves a part of the PRC and have little to no support for reunification with mainland China.
The question here is whether Harvard's UN committee will continue to have the same info give in the handbook next year or change it by next year to avoid another incident.
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