 I'm Mark Shlove, the host of Think Tech Hawaii's Law Across the Sea program. Today we're going across the sea to Taipei, Taiwan to talk with J.K. Lin. J.K. is an international intellectual property law attorney. He is a director of the Taiwan International Patent and Law Office, or TIPLO, for short. And I've known him for several years. I've asked him to talk to us because Taiwan has been in the news a lot lately. But I wanted to get a personal view, somebody who's there to talk about current events. And J.K. is an experienced and knowledgeable Taiwan attorney who knows what's happening on the ground in Taiwan. So J.K., I want to welcome you to our program. And how are you? Thank you, Mr. Shblav. You know, he just looks so 20 years younger than you. So I just totally like making a new friends. But thank you so much for having me. And you know, it was a pretty hasty condition that I got your email. Because I was expecting my wife to come back from... She's Japanese and she was scheduled to come back from Tokyo. And then amidst the missiles, amidst the Chinese barbarians drill, I was really, she just postponed her flights for twice, just in order to, yeah, be on the stage. That's what I want to ask you about. I want to ask you about current events. And tell us a little bit of background about Taiwan and how you, you know, Taiwan got to where it is and what's happening now. Great, Mark. So as I suggested, I'm going to have some kind of open remark. The first thing is that all these things, you know, not only in Taiwan, but nowadays we have the Western, something happened in Black Sea coast. And in the West Pacific, in a Pacific region, we have all looming prices here and already, you know, inflation happening there. Our observation is that we're about time to really settle down this euphoria, the thinking that we already have a new order since about, you know, the 1990s. But, you know, that was shortly after the Tiananmen, but then the Berlin Walls failed, but somehow the West world were intoxicated with this euphoria, thinking that a new order. And so China and Russia were welcome to join. And then later on, by then, Taiwan was a victim because, you know, it was seen by the assertion of China. It insists that Taiwan needed to be disposed of. And it was so scary because in a lot of, for about more than 20 years, Taiwan was labeled even by some very prominent American top, you know, presidents as troublemakers. But even doing among the kind of currents, Li Tianhui, president who was elected by the first direct election in Taiwan in 1996, first direct election, was invited and was given permission to give speech in Cornell University. And that displayed how much support from the congressional and from the general politician level we had from the United States. So, and the second thing, but all things considered, we still have those, you know, the seat of the upheavals for the current days, all we just sold during those years. And second thing is that, we're zooming back to Taiwan, the persecution from the Shankar Shack, you know, a lot of people didn't know that. The regime was not kind of the local people when they came, escaped from China in exile. They somehow occupied Taiwan without legitimacy because, you know, the San Francisco Treaty just was for Japan to renounce all the sovereignty of Taiwan, but not to hand it over to any specific party. Yet the Shankar Shack in that the chaos of losing China to the communists settled down to Taiwan, and a lot of persecutions happened. And even though some Taiwanese intellect, like Dr. Chiang-Peng Mi-Min, who passed away two months ago, in yesterday, we had a big ceremony. And President Tsai went to the ceremony to justify and also to give him a trophy to confirm his independence and self-determination notion that he has been living for. You know, he died at 99 years old. But his whole life was for this very important cause, for the independence and for sovereignty, for permanent, for sustainable prosperity of Taiwan. And he died, but luckily, the current Taiwanese government from top of the president respected the mentor instead of avoiding that. You know, if KMT's president is ruling today, he would just totally ignore the event. He would just distance from him. But nowadays, we are highly aware that we have to be tough and really just speak up and saying to the world that Taiwan needs a status in the world so that we can keep our security and also maintain the stability of the inter-Pacific region and also benefit the whole world. And the third one is the fast-evolving Taiwan connected to the free, civilized world. This overlaps with what I had said. What is happening in Taiwan is only its little aspect, it may be, but it can not be zoomed into Taiwan. But in fact, it is only a drama in this whole big theater of the world revolution. And but finally among this, what we emphasize that for Taiwan to have been able to develop to the current status that we have high tech, we have good society, we have universal, affordable medical care, we have very loving society and good people relationship and a transparent democracy that these are the major reasons that Taiwanese are winning the respect and love from the whole world. But another important thing common Taiwanese know is that without the alliance led by the United States of America, Nancy Pelosi's C40 of writing, but thousands of people are on the ground and tracking her flight for hours. No one will be certain that she would just show up. Well, let's talk about Nancy Pelosi, but I hear you saying that Taiwan has been going through a lot of changes over the years and you're in a position now that you wanna maintain it. Nancy Pelosi came to Taiwan and there's a photo of her. How was she received and what did the Taiwanese people think of her? Taiwanese people wish to just give her a bear hug, all of us. However, we don't have the kind of relations where just, and so whatever, even Pelosi herself needed just package her schedule to be like on the limbo until she really showed up and to accompany with some other country's visitations. But everybody even in retrospect to know that Taiwan was a major or even the single most important destination because at this moment, Taiwan needs her. And well, on this occasion really including me, I've never expected or anticipated that she would pay this much attention as I want. And it was a really positive surprise. And so people in Taiwan are overwhelmed and overjoyed but at the same time they couldn't do as much as you'd like to do. But you can see how many people were just expecting her arrival and that's all it can do. It's like aliens, we're looking on the aliens arrival, UFO, we're kind of scared but we just hope that they can really come and say hello to us because we know that it carries a lot of hope and promises. Well, but there was also a threat from China, right? No, no, we don't really care about that. Cause you know, a lot of people, China has been propagating on that, advertising that if she were to ever show up, American carriers would be blown away and it has many entertaining materials on the internet in this part of the world. So no, maybe they said, and now the conspiracy or these kind of analysis experts are now coming up with articles saying that Biden is another fox and he is using this kind of Chinese reaction to allow Chinese military and the regime to enshrine themselves or put the food in a quick send of their own trap because as the more they react in a barbarian way the worse their international image will become and then eventually it will be for the better of the free world. So in other words, what I hear you saying is that actually their reaction of China rebounded against them and made them look very bad but and you and the people in Taiwan were not feeling a tremendous threat. Just, there was just a lot of talk. I mean, what are the long-term effects of this for Taiwan with China? This was like an incident and so suddenly, you know, like an impromptu show off of Pelosi's charms in this part of the world but it does really like you said it could just signify or leave rather long-term effect and I think they are positive because it reinforced and fortified the relation between Taiwan and United States and the important part is that Pelosi no matter what her political spectrum is viewed in America, her presence in Taiwan is a solid goal guarantee for the Taiwanese because we know what she says sounds very, very truthful. Promising to keep the Taiwan Relations Act. It was established in 1979 and now 43 years and that single message is a knob and it's beyond any money can buy. And for this time, we're happy to say that this is not the result of any PR action or promotion that Taiwanese initiated. It seemed like of course we must have the government, the diplomatic sections must have also put in a lot of efforts. However, Nancy Pelosi and behind her, I would assume that even Mr. Biden, President Biden would also have even you would see that the military's opinions would came out with a little anti-advice against her sudden arrival but all things summed up. This is the very successful strategy to put China in a bigger, magnifying mirrors for the world to see what China is. And for China to fluster somehow in the international arena and knowing that they can really just, and another very vital difference is that when Ukraine suffering from before the true invasion true invasion launched by Russia, Mr. Biden was announcing that over and over but he's not announcing China's invasion on Taiwan. So now we count on what is being said by Mr. Biden, President Biden himself or even the intelligence of the United States. Yeah. A little bit more about the relationship between Taiwan and China. I mean, do the citizens of Taiwan believe or identify as Chinese or Taiwanese or both? I mean, what did they, I mean, when I use the word China do the Taiwanese feel that includes Taiwan or what, and what does the future hold for Taiwan? I mean, do you think Taiwan is gonna become part of the PRC China? That will probably happen only when the human being reached another galaxy. Maybe, I don't know when that'll happen. It probably will. But, you know, first of all, how many people, you know, the reason that Taiwan was kept almost intact for 8,000 years, you know, Chinese always brag about their length of the history about more than 6,000 years, but they have never really succeeded in colonizing Taiwan until maybe 300 years ago even after the Holanders had a portion colonies in Taiwan. The reason behind that is that Taiwanese used to be populated by Aborigines people very much related not the Northern Micronesia, but the Southern Micronesia people, you know, these Taiwanese Aborigines people. Micronesian, Southern Micronesian people including Filipino people and those Micronesians related to them. And the Flatland people, including some of my ancestors, you know, my grand-grandfather, I just got to check his background up. He doesn't seem to have any Chinese character name until he was baptized in Kaohsiung. And then there were some very prominent preachers, Christian, you know, spreading Christian and taking care of these people. So they were also Christianized, but at the same time these Flatlands indigenous people were able to mix into the immigration society. And that does not truly indicate that immigration outnumbered the local people. It's hard to really determine it now. But research, biological research, since about 90 years have reported that the immunity system of Taiwanese people in general is more similar to the Micronesian people other than the samples taken from China. So the first place, yeah, we're not saying that we should stick to ethnicity, but you know, this is something to refer to. And the second thing is that the Chinese people coming from with the Chiang Kai-shek, these people are taking the advantage and nowadays the remnants of the KMT are visiting, you know, they're sending an entourage to visit some of the people in offices. In China, I missed this military drills and it raises, you know, critical bashing in Taiwan. And you can imagine that when they are ruling Taiwan, you know, the level of persecution and it was called the white terror. It lasted in two to eight. There was a first encounter of Taiwanese people in the first place, trying to negotiate with the officers but eventually they were slaughtered without, you know, any remnants. And so these things happened for, and martial law were imposed in Taiwan for 46 years. And all these things happened, but Taiwanese was lucky and brave enough to come up with their own opposition groups. And that became the DDP, which is now rolling Taiwan today. And that happened in 1985 and two years later from the establishment of the PBT, the martial law were lifted and Shang Kai-shek's son, Shang Jing-guo, was brave and intelligent. He knew that the time, and he was trained in Moscow and also studied in Siberia. And you know, the evilness and devil was part of that communist. So he insisted there would be no contacts of negotiation because, you know, the national part military failed because they trusted the communists for many to count. Well, so it sounds like Taiwanese consider themselves independent. And not just part of China. For now, it's almost crystal clear. There was a, the history that I mentioned was early on, but later on, even after the 2000 years, like 2014, there was a sunflower revolution that event featured hundreds of thousands of students taking over the Congress House because they knew that the ruling party, by then it was KMT, it was President Ma, tried to just clear the House, a package, a very wholesale package, allowing disposing all these trades and transactions and allowing the Chinese to do whatever they wanted like, like sending Taiwan to the disposal of China. But, you know, and without any deliberation and depriving chance of discussion at the Congress. So students took over the Congress and occupied in the Congress for about two months. And then of course, avoided the legislation. And that was the event that pretty much revolutionarily set up the level of Taiwanese consciousness. And then people started to notice how these 20-something or 30-something Taiwan independence level is much higher than those older than 40s. You have a lot of conservative and a lot of, but this kind of the philosophical revolution will become contagious. So nowadays you can, and polls are showing you that if you have only two choices, Chinese or Taiwanese, 90% of people in Taiwan would say that I'm a Taiwanese, only less than 3% of people would say that I'm, because nowadays the way the tourists behave in Taiwan, that's a small thing, but you know, the way the Chinese bully in Taiwan and all these pandemic lockdowns and starvation to death, all these things and the Hong Kong's persecution, one by one, Taiwanese people, even for those most layout, non-concerning political, people want to do nothing with politics, just started to know that and always they know that there's hardly anything they can win from befriending with China. And a lot of Chinese businessmen expatriate in Taiwan businessmen in China ended up, you know, yesterday there was reports just saying that people spending 20 years and the final thing was to ask someone to send his base of ashes, cremated ashes back to Taiwan. That was the last rally that he has for the 20 years in state. A lot of these kinds of cases. Let me move on a little bit. It's good to get your insight from a person in Taiwan because we don't hear very much, we hear news reports, but we don't hear about people actually in Taiwan and where they're coming from and what ideas they have. But I want to talk personally a little bit because I knew your father, MS Lin, and he was the founder of your law firm, the Taiwan International Patent Law Office and you basically took over and followed in his footsteps. And I'd like to put up a photo of your dad, your father, MS Lin, there it is. I wanna know, how does it feel to follow in your father's footsteps in this law firm? Oh, in the beginning, you know, I was almost brought down by some coup of some rebellious members, you know. And to the extent that the receptionist sitting on the front desk of the office needed to just comfort me and saying that, oh, you look so sad, I'm so sad for you. It lasted for about a year or so before people settled down and we're lucky that most of our, my father by the time he passed away, we had about 180 members in the, about 20 lawyers and 10 patent attorneys and other supporting members. Nowadays, we have about 300 people and so we have, substantially we have grown up but I'm just so lucky to have a father who was laid down such a good ground and not to mention the sentimental, the kind of attachment to him but there's nothing you could do and sometimes even to the opposite, I would feel that all my liberty and all these luck is a gift in exchange of his life. You know, sometimes if you have a very, very long living father, well, he could be very loving and very liberal, you know, allowing you to do things. You also witnessed a lot of old men like to temper with younger generations. So yeah, it's a, he was a staff. He set the pace for you. He established the office for you and where you would go into the future and I wanna also, I wanna put up your law firm's website and on that website, you have the words praying for the whole world for early return of peace and prosperity and that's an interesting number of words. What prompted you to put them and it's over a beautiful city too in the photo. What is behind those words? What do they mean to you and where does it come from? Yeah, I became fascinated with taking, you know, with my Sony smartphone and taking pictures and let the application stitching them up. So that Panama Rana picture was in fact composed of more than 30 pictures that I took, one by one. And you know- What do the words mean for you? The words came to my mind when probably during this beginning periods of the pandemic. And so that was the, I pretty much have to confide that I am spiritually very much a Christian ever since, because I know that I've been redeemed and rescued, resurrected or truly rescued from the Death Valley. So I pray sometimes and I told my families that I wouldn't roll out the kind of very fanfare of praying if I need to, like, you know, suddenly just, you know, carrying a Bible in and kneeling down in the center of a waiting room of a terminal, but I haven't done that kind of thing. But I truly pray that, you know, this incident I know that it was initiated from China but somehow for this pandemic with the inconvenience of a pandemic people would slow down and think about the future, you know, in a relatively easier way because they're not, they can turn down a lot of redundant invitations. Yeah, they were, you know, we don't try to just blame people for point, finger pointing. And I hope that yeah, most of the people can just think about their future together and just try to work it out. Okay, now we have about one minute left and I'd like to ask you, where do you see Taiwan going? You got a minute, where, what is the future? What is the future hold for Taiwan? It is exuberant. Is that a good word? That's fine. Do you have a word for it? Number one is I told you that we have all types of high-tech industry and we also have traditional manufacturing capability, medical industry, so and food sufficiency, self-sufficiency, and this society is loving in a democracy transparency. On the other hand, we've very much geared up to the attack or potential harassment from China. And that was during the 90s, even under the supervision or kind of critical opinion of the United States, but nowadays they were asking us for a longer or mid-range missile. We've already come up with 90% of the technology skills and eventually they were made possible. So now we're very well-prepared for all types of challenges. So the future of Taiwan, if you give me any other place, I wouldn't go. I would just stick to here. And I'll think about China if they can come up with a 12-cylinder engine car like Ferrari. Yeah, if they become so savvy like the Europeans and so intelligent like the Americans. All right, well, J.K., but I love China. I wouldn't like people to mistake that I have any prejudice. We speak particularly me. I'm a language mania and I can speak the kind of a Mandarin, like these officers, square language and mess up with them. That's, I love to have the kind of fun, but nowadays the Chinese and the Russian governments are keeping their people too harsh. And I hope that we can really have more fun with the people. So that, yeah, that would be the beginning, the harbinger of the true world peace, right? Well, J.K., I wanna thank you very much for being my guest today and waking up early in Taiwan to talk with us. No, please, no wake. If you wake up a moment ago, your face will be bloated. I would let people see that. All right, everybody. We've had a nice trip to Taiwan this morning and we've learned a little bit about what really goes on there, something more than we hear on the nightly news. So thank you very much, J.K. Lin and we look forward to seeing you again sometime. Oh, hi. Thank you so much for watching Think Tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on YouTube and the follow button on Vimeo. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn and donate to us at thinktechhawaii.com. Mahalo.