The talks between officials from China and Taiwan last week could never have been expected to produce very tangible results. But the six-day encounter -- the highest-level talks between the two sides since the Communists drove the Nationalists from the mainland in 1949 -- was undoubtedly a political coup for Taiwan. Nothing could have shown the government in Taipei to better advantage than to have it projected in such direct contrast with the government in Beijing. Mr. Koo Chen-fu, Taiwan's senior envoy, had only to insist that reunification is impossible until China reaches Taiwan's state of democratic development. Anything the Chinese Vice-Premier, Mr. Qian Qichen, then said against Taiwan's preaching "Taiwan-style democracy" was bound to look bad.

In fact, Mr. Qian went a long way to accommodate Taiwan's legitimate interests. "Taiwan now practises capitalist system and after the reunification Taiwan may retain the capitalist system while the mainland of the motherland practises a socialist system," Mr. Qian said. "By reunification, we mean to safeguard the state territorial integrity and sovereignty, not to argue over systems." Mr. Qian was expressing a profound pragmatism, unimaginable only a few years ago when Beijing railed against the "renegade province" of Taiwan in the most strident terms, and denounced the Kuomintang "brigands" who ruled it.

The Communist Government in Beijing still insists that the integrity of all China requires Taiwan to be reunified with the mainland. Beijing still appears to hope that Taiwan may be returned to the fold, in much the same way as Hong Kong has been. At the same time, its softer language is some recognition of the reality of Taiwan's endurance as a distinct political entity and the extreme unlikelihood of its reabsorption by the mainland on Beijing's terms.

Last week's talks help Taiwan, especially by making clear how different is its position compared with Hong Kong's. The more Beijing relies on the Hong Kong comparison, the more it underlines the difference. Beijing asks, for example, if the capitalists of Hong Kong can accept special status within China -- the "one China, two systems" model -- why not Taiwan? But Taiwan has always been very different from Hong Kong. Both are sudden creations of the 20th century, built on the energy of Chinese enterprise working outside the orbit of the old Middle Kingdom. But Hong Kong was for most of its existence a colony, not a democracy. It never developed sufficient inner political strength to resist its disposal by Britain into the hands of Beijing. Taiwan, since 1949, has been the seat of what claimed to be a Chinese government in exile. However absurd the Kuomintang regime's claim to be the legitimate government of China, the pretence has been a rock on which to build and sustain the separate polity that has evolved in Taiwan over the past half-century.

Taiwan now is a democracy. It is not a perfect open society. It has unresolved conflicts, including those between the indigenous Taiwanese and the mainland interlopers and their descendants. But Taiwan is, to all intents and purposes, an independent nation. The independence of its 21 million people is strengthened by its democratic system. It will not be dictated to by the present oligarchy ruling China. There might well be reunification some time in the future. But it will not come by force such as China has been accustomed to threaten over the years. And it is more likely to come when China embraces democracy -- that is, on Taiwan's terms.