If you drove through Asunción, Paraguay, before the 2020 pandemic, heading east from the city center you would have come across the Chiang Kai Shek School. It was a rare sight in Latin America prior to its COVID-induced closure: an institution that paid homage to the nationalist leader of Mainland China, who also served as Taiwan's first president at the head of a government-in-exile. Paraguay, in fact, is the only South American country that officially recognizes Taiwan's independence from communist China. (In Central America, Guatemala and Belize do so as well.)
The Taiwan issue became contentious during the recent presidential election, in which the left-wing candidate, Efraín Alegre, vowed to cut ties with the island in order to open trade with China. Alegre, however, lost by a 16-point margin to Santiago Peña of the ruling—and historically pro-Taiwan—Colorado Party.
