And besides, don't you have your own independence to worry about at home? ;)
What do you know about me? my profile here is anonymous.
But to answer your question: yes, being catalan I support Taiwan as a sincere act of international solidarity, just like so many Taiwanese support my country against the unwanted spanish occupation.
None of them share Western values of democracy and human rights. They're all barely democracies. Japan and SK are economically integrated with the West, that's all. If you mean first world country say first world country, that entire liberal values shtick is just ridiculous.
Japan has state indoctrination. Openly historically revisionist units have the power to cover up and lie about history.
I assure you that such news is being squashed in SK and Japan, often and successfully. There are countless examples you can find. It wouldn't be headline news in all but a few smaller publications unless the government and it's allies were okay with it.
Is it as bad as China? No. Is it better than average? Also no. Freedom of speech is okay though in both.
India is especially egregious. There is little free speech, political freedoms, or freedom of the press. Various minority parties have their members killed, and their buildings burnt every so often.
I don't know enough about Taiwan to say anything, though.
What are you looking at for your average? I would say that the global average is pretty low when you consider each country, and Japan and SK is in the upper half. You have to take into account dysfunctional and repressive kleptocracies in the Middle East, Africa, and South America
There are not many countries in the world that are so dysfunctional as far as democracy that the same party can stay in power for 50 years, nor that literally no single president has managed not to resign. If SK and Japan were in Africa, the Middle East, or South America and had economic outcomes commensurate with the region but on the higher end, we would call them dysfunctional and repressive kelptocracies.
Like come on, if you saw a country in Africa where the same party was in power for a lifetime and the conviction rates exceed 99%, where judges would rather resign than declare someone not guilty, and where a an extremist political faction infiltrated the educational bureaucracy and textbook publishers to prevent historical event from being taught, you would call it a dysfunctional and repressive kleptocracy. The only reason that's not extended to Japan and SK is by comparison with China and because they are our allies.