(Reuters) -China said on Wednesday it would hold a ceremony to mark the 80th anniversary of the “retrocession” of Taiwan to Chinese rule at the end of World War Two.
Here is a timeline about Taiwan, China, the war and its aftermath:
1895 – Defeated in the First Sino-Japanese War, China’s Qing dynasty signs the Treaty of Shimonoseki ceding sovereignty over Taiwan to Japan.
1911 – The Qing dynasty is overthrown in a revolution and the following year the Republic of China is declared.
1927 – Chinese Communist Party stages an uprising against the government, viewed as the start of China’s civil war.
1931 – Japan invades northeast China’s Manchuria.
1937 – Japan invades the rest of China.
1943 – Chiang, U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill sign the Cairo Declaration which states Taiwan will be “restored” to the Republic of China.
1945 – The Potsdam Declaration calls for Japan’s unconditional surrender and reaffirms the Cairo Declaration. After Japan’s defeat, Taiwan is formally handed over to the Republic of China government on October 25.
1946 – Truce between republican and communist forces collapses and the Chinese civil war resumes.
1947 – An uprising in Taiwan against the ruling Republican Chinese government follows tensions over social, cultural and political issues, and is bloodily put down.
1949 – Chiang retreats to Taiwan after Mao wins the civil war and establishes the People’s Republic of China. Mao vows to “liberate” the island.
1951 – Japan signs the San Francisco Peace Treaty renouncing its claims to Taiwan, but the island’s sovereignty is left unresolved in the document. Beijing says the treaty is “illegal and invalid”, since it was not a party to it.
1952 – Treaty of Peace between the Republic of China and Japan signed, reaffirming Japan’s renunciation of its claims to Taiwan, which the government in Taiwan says is confirmation of the previous transfer of sovereignty to the Republic of China.
To this day, the governments in Taipei and Beijing do not officially recognise each other.
Republic of China remains Taiwan’s formal name.
Sources – Taiwanese, Chinese governments.
(Writing by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
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