Political status of Taiwan

The political status of Taiwan is a longstanding geopolitical subject focusing on the sovereignty of the island of Taiwan and its associated islands. The dispute stems from the alleged retrocession of Taiwan from the Empire of Japan to the Republic of China (ROC) in 1945, and the ROC government’s retreat from mainland China to Taiwan as the result of the Chinese Civil War in 1949. The Taiwan Area since then has become the major territorial base of the ROC and which has exercised state authority there independently. Though never having control of Taiwan, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)-led People’s Republic of China (PRC) claims it as an inalienable province of China. The PRC’s claim is based on the theory of state succession, whereby it deems itself the regime that replaced the ROC as the sole legitimate government of China upon its establishment in 1949, and thus it denies the sovereignty of the ROC in Taiwan under its one China principle. The geopolitical dispute is also a pivotal subject in China–United States relations and China–Japan relations.