Institute of Taiwan Studies

Taiwan has held a deep suspicion and concerns about the various Taiwan-related institutions in the PRC. In 2002, officials from Taiwan's National Security Bureau claimed in the Legislative Yuan that Jiang Dianming, former director of the Institute of Taiwan Studies, was the director of the 15th Bureau of the Ministry of State Security (MSS); Jiang Dianming's public identity was that he was a reporter for Xinhua News Agency, and he later served as deputy editor-in-chief of Guangming Daily, belonging to the propaganda department. In early December 2000, the deputy director of the National Security Bureau stated at the Democratic Progressive Party Legislative Yuan caucus that Yu Keli, deputy director of the Institute of Taiwan Studies, who had visited Taiwan for academic exchanges in 2000, "was not only a high-level think tank on mainland China's Taiwan policy, but his actual identity was 'deputy director of the 15th Bureau of the Ministry of State Security'"; but the information finally confirmed was that the MSS had no relationship with Yu Keli. In 2005, Yu Keli said that the accusations made by relevant Taiwanese parties against mainland scholars on Taiwan studies were based on the rigid Cold War mentality and politicized normal academic exchanges between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. Later, Yu Keli frequently visited Taiwan and was not blocked.^[5][14]

However, similar suspicions have continued to be heard in Taiwan since then. For example, on March 11, 2015, Want Daily reported that the Institute of Taiwan Studies was nominally affiliated with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, but its actual personnel and funding came from the MSS, and it was a bureau-level unit. The predecessor of the Institute of Taiwan Studies was the Taiwan Studies Institute of the Central Investigation Department of the CCP, which was responsible for collecting and analyzing Taiwan intelligence. It was later transferred to the MSS due to the abolition of the Central Investigation Department.^[15] The statement of Caixun Biweekly in November 2016 was similar to that of Want Daily, except that it said that after the abolition of the Taiwan Studies Institute of the Central Investigation Department, it was transferred to the MSS and the Intelligence Department of the General Staff of the People's Liberation Army. The statements of Want Daily and Caixun Biweekly are exactly the same as those made by the deputy director of the National Security Bureau of the Republic of China in 2000.^[16]

On the morning of June 15, 2015, Shi Fanglong, director of the LSE Taiwan Research Program, met with Zhou Zhihuai, director of the Institute of Taiwan Studies, Zhang Hua, assistant researcher of the Institute of Taiwan Studies, Liu Guoshen, dean of the Institute of Taiwan Studies of Xiamen University, Li Peng, deputy dean of the Institute of Taiwan Studies of Xiamen University, Xin Qiang, director of the Center for Taiwan Studies of Fudan University, and Zhang Jiegen, associate researcher of the Institute of International Studies of Fudan University, to discuss China's Taiwan policy and cross-strait relations, Taiwan's domestic political development, the United States' Asia-Pacific policy and its geopolitical impact on the security situation in East Asia. On January 14, 2020, Xia News quoted the website of the LSE Taiwan Research Program to disclose this matter, saying that the Institute of Taiwan Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the Institute of Taiwan Studies of Xiamen University, the National Association for Taiwan Studies and the Shanghai Institute of Taiwan Studies are all "Chinese think tanks and intelligence units that integrate Taiwan research, intelligence gathering and united front propaganda".^[17]

• Chinese unification
• United front in Taiwan