President's advisors make suggestions

The President's Advisory Group on Cross Strait Relations yesterday appealed to President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) to deal with cross-strait disputes and react to Beijing's "one China" principle in accordance with the Constitution of the Republic of China.

The advisory group also made public a statement of "three acknowledgements and four suggestions" after a five-hour closed-door meeting, saying that it could be regarded as the group's formal suggestions to Chen.

Taiwan's "three acknowledgments" mean: The current state of cross-strait affairs is the result of the developments of history; that the PRC and Taiwan neither mutually represent one another nor belong to each other and that any change to the current cross-strait situation should be approved by the people of Taiwan through democratic measures.

The third acknowledgement went on to say that people are the pillar of a nation and the purpose of a nation is to guarantee their security and benefits. Seeing that languages on both sides of the Strait are similar and the physical distance between the two is small, the people on both sides of the Strait should work to uphold and enhance this.

The four suggestions in the statement are as follows:

1. To improve cross-strait relations, to deal with cross-strait disputes and to deal with China's "one China" principle according to the ROC Constitution.

2. To create a new mechanism or adjust current measures to continually coordinate the different opinions on national development or cross-strait relations which would include all political parties as well as the public.

3. To appeal to the PRC to respect both the dignity and the "space" of Taiwan and to end military threats and work together with Taiwan to sign a peace agreement. In this way, confidence can be built and a win-win situation will be established.

4. To declare to the world that the government and people of Taiwan insist on peace, democracy and prosperity as cornerstones to cooperating with the international community. With this in mind, Taiwan will construct new cross-strait relations with sincerity and patience.

Hsiao Hsin-huang (蕭新煌), spokesman for the advisory group, did not elaborate on the statement but said that the group was expecting reactions to the comments to help aid their future discussions.

"We believe that all political parties and the public will make comments on our statement within the coming month, even the other side of Taiwan Strait," Hsiao said.

Hsiao said that the advisory group, therefore, planned to hold its next meeting in one month after observing reactions and comments.

"Our mission is to create an opportunity to reopen the dialogue between both sides, and the mission is still unfinished," Hsiao added during his press conference after the meeting.

The advisory group held its seventh meeting yesterday at the Taipei Guest House to discuss China's definition of the "one China" principle and Taiwan's response. The group's 25 members had spent over a month and four meetings to try to reach a consensus on the issue.

Yesterday's meeting began with a discussion of a basic version of the advisory body's statement, which was written by Public Television System President Wu Feng-shan (吳豐山). There was keen debate between the DPP representative and pro-unification representatives that focused on whether or not the to use the phrase to "jointly deal with the future `one China' issue" in the formal statement.