BEIJING — Vanuatu, a tiny cluster of Pacific islands, doesn't tend to capture a major slice of the world's attention. The sun-soaked chain is perhaps best known for its tourist trade and its 15 minutes of fame as the backdrop for a "Survivor" series on television.
In recent days, however, it has become a belle of the cross-strait ball as China and Taiwan open their checkbooks and compete for its loyalty.
Taiwanese Foreign Minister Mark Chen and Vanuatu's prime minister, Serge Vohor, announced Nov. 3 in Taipei that they had agreed to establish diplomatic relations, in effect ending Vanuatu's decade-long embrace of China.
Despite their split in 1949 at the end of a civil war, China views Taiwan as an integral part of its territory with no right to conduct foreign relations.
China quickly severs ties with any country that recognizes Taiwan. Besides Vanuatu, which consists of 80 islands northeast of Australia that are collectively the size of Connecticut, 26 countries -- mostly impoverished nations in Latin America, Africa and the Pacific -- recognize Taiwan. Those that recognize Beijing number 160.
The day after Vanuatu was apparently added to Taiwan's column, however, Chinese spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue announced that Vanuatu was still in Beijing's camp, quoting the South Pacific nation's foreign minister. To hammer the point home, Chinese Ambassador Bao Shusheng warned that diplomatic ties with Taiwan would cost Vanuatu $10 million in aid.
This was quickly followed by a salvo from Taiwan. No, it said, Vanuatu was in fact Taiwan's newest diplomatic partner. Taiwan has reportedly offered $30 million in aid.
Not to be outdone, China countered Thursday that Vanuatu, a nation of about 200,000, was back in its camp, having withdrawn its support for the earlier communique.
Oops. On Friday, a spokesman for the prime minister of Vanuatu said diplomatic ties with Taiwan remained in place, even as Taiwanese foreign affairs spokesman Michel Lu counseled citizens "not to panic" while the ministry figured out what was going on.
Analysts doubt that this is the last chapter.
"The mainland won't give up," said Zhu Xianlong, a professor at Macao University of Science and Technology. "They'll try and do everything possible diplomatically to win back this tiny country."
The diplomatic flip-flop also reflects an internal squabble in Vanuatu, a country that saw a former prime minister convicted of forgery and the current prime minister almost arrested in September in an incident that remains under investigation.
