<P> The island of Formosa (Taiwan) had an indigenous population when Dutch traders in need of an Asian base to trade with Japan and China arrived in 1623 . The Dutch East India Company (VOC) built Fort Zeelandia . They soon began to rule the natives . China took control in the 1660s, and sent in settlers . By the 1890s there were about 2.3 million Han Chinese and 200,000 members of indigenous tribes . After its victory in the First Sino - Japanese War in 1894--95, the peace treaty ceded the island to Japan . It was Japan's first colony . </P> <P> Japan expected far more benefits from the occupation of Taiwan than the limited benefits it actually received . Japan realized that its home islands could only support a limited resource base, and it hoped that Taiwan, with its fertile farmlands, would make up the shortage . By 1905, Taiwan was producing rice and sugar and paying for itself with a small surplus . Perhaps more important, Japan gained Asia - wide prestige by being the first non-European country to operate a modern colony . It learned how to adjust its German - based bureaucratic standards to actual conditions, and how to deal with frequent insurrections . The ultimate goal was to promote Japanese language and culture, but the administrators realized they first had to adjust to the Chinese culture of the people . Japan had a civilizing mission, and it opened schools so that the peasants could become productive and patriotic manual workers . Medical facilities were modernized, and the death rate plunged . To maintain order, Japan installed a police state that closely monitored everyone . In 1945, Japan was stripped of its empire and Taiwan was returned to China . </P> <P> In 1905, the Empire of Japan and the Korean Empire signed the Eulsa Treaty, which brought Korea into the Japanese sphere of influence as a protectorate . The Treaty was a result of the Japanese victory in the Russo - Japanese War and Japan wanting to increase its hold over the Korean Peninsula . The Eulsa Treaty led to the signing of the 1907 Treaty two years later . The 1907 Treaty ensured that Korea would act under the guidance of a Japanese resident general and Korean internal affairs would be under Japanese control . Korean Emperor Gojong was forced to abdicate in favour of his son, Sunjong, as he protested Japanese actions in the Hague Conference . Finally in 1910, the Annexation Treaty was signed, formally annexing Korea to Japan . </P> <P> Officially, China remained a unified country . In practice, European powers and Japan took effective control of certain port cities and their surrounding areas from the middle nineteenth century until the 1920s . Technically speaking, they exercised "extraterritoriality" that was imposed in a series of unequal treaties . </P>

Which of the following was not a problem in europe in the century leading up to world war i