Twelve states recognise the government in Taipei, most of them small islands and Central American or Caribbean countries, plus the Vatican. In 1969 there were more than seventy. Every other state recognises Beijing, which requires it as the price of relations. Taiwan, the world's twenty-first largest economy, has no seat in the United Nations, the World Health Organization or the aviation authority, and its president cannot travel abroad without a dispute over whose airspace he may cross. Most large countries keep unofficial offices in Taipei that do everything an embassy does.
The wider dispute and each side's full account: Taiwan.
Where it stands · September 2026
In September 2026 South Korea reaffirmed its One China policy during a dispute over a Taiwan Pavilion at the Gwangju Biennale. China urged Panama to uphold the One China principle after Panamanian lawmakers formed a friendship group with Taiwan. The Philippines stated that it recognizes the One China policy while continuing economic ties with Taiwan. The US ambassador said there was no change in US policy on Taiwan after the Xi-Trump meeting.
What the dispute is about
What the 1971 resolution decided. It gave China's seat to the People's Republic and expelled "the representatives of Chiang Kai-shek". Beijing reads that as settling that Taiwan is part of China. Taipei and a growing number of Western parliaments reply that the text says nothing about Taiwan at all.
Participation without recognition. Whether twenty-three million people can take part in bodies that deal with epidemics, air safety or police cooperation without that implying statehood. They did, as an observer at the health assembly, in the years when Beijing approved of Taipei's government.
The allies. Each switch of recognition comes with aid, loans or infrastructure from the winner. Both sides have paid; China can now pay more.
