Can Singapore keep up its foreign policy balancing act after Hong Kong military vehicles seizure?
The city state juggles global superpowers’ interests as South China Sea dispute rolls on
With no immediate end in sight to the impasse over the seizure of Singapore’s military vehicles in Hong Kong, and amid rising flak from Beijing, the city state’s long-time leaders – reputed for an adroit diplomatic touch – are finding themselves in the unfamiliar position of justifying their foreign policy to citizens at home.
In power since 1959, the People’s Action Party has traditionally faced little domestic dissent over its foreign policy of embracing all major powers regardless of ideology or politics. Singapore has strong ties with both China and the United States.
The pragmatic “maximum number of friends” approach was first championed by Singapore’s late founding leader Lee Kuan Yew as an essential bulwark for small states. Today, it remains at the heart of the foreign policy of his son and current premier, Lee Hsien Loong.
But faced with opacity following the November 23 seizure of nine Terrex military vehicles by Hong Kong customs, and amid growing frustrations brought on by Chinese state media’s increasingly regular insults towards Singapore for not siding with Beijing in the South China Sea territorial dispute, some commentators are beginning to question their leaders’ ability to maintain the country’s diplomatic balancing act.
In a scathing online commentary this week, former newspaper editor turned government critic P.N. Balji described the seizure in Hong Kong as Beijing “using a proxy territory to strike on its behalf and behest”.
