The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CPC) have agreed to allow KMT Chairman Lien Chan (連戰) to visit China, a Hong Kong daily said yesterday.
"Chinese authorities have agreed in principle to the idea of Lien Chan ... visiting China in June this year," a Hong Kong's Ming Pao daily quoted "reliable sources" as saying.
The report comes amid the media hype surrounding the visit of a 30-member KMT delegation headed by party Vice Chairman Chiang Pin-kun (江丙坤) on a self-proclaimed "ice-breaking journey" to China.
Chiang yesterday held a meeting in Beijing with Chen Yunlin (陳雲林), director of the Taiwan Affairs Office of China's State Council, that marked the first of such meetings between the two former rival parties 56 years after 1949, when the KMT was militarily defeated by the Chinese Communist Party in the civil war. The meeting was reportedly focusing on economic cooperation and cross-strait exchanges.
"We have openly reiterated many times that we are willing to talk with any Taiwan representatives, groups or parties, who accept the 92 `consensus' and oppose Taiwan's independence," Chen said during the meeting.
Chen Yunlin said the meeting covered issues including importing agricultural products from Taiwan, resuming exportation of fishermen to Taiwan, cross-strait insurance and monetary exchanges, regular cross-strait flights on the weekend and holidays and direct cargo flights.
The trip has been touted by the KMT as the first contact between party leaders since the KMT fled to Taiwan in 1949. According to the Ming Pao, KMT Legislator Chu Feng-chih (朱鳳芝), a member of the KMT delegation, revealed that if the current trip was successful and if Beijing extended goodwill, Lien's proposed trip to China might be possible in June.
The Ming Pao reported that there was a tacit agreement reached last year that Lien would visit China prior to assuming the presidency if he won the election, and that Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) would meet him in person. The plan was dropped after Lien lost the election.
Meanwhile, Chiang visited the tomb of party founder Sun Yat-sen yesterday, laying a wreath at Sun's mausoleum outside Nanjing, the Nationalists' former capital. Both the CCP and the KMT revere Sun as leader of the 1911 revolution that ended imperial rule and created a Chinese republic.
"My heart was filled with limitless excitement and deep emotion," Chiang said. "It was very moving to visit."
Chiang's visit comes amid a surge in tensions over China's "Anti-Secession" Law. Chiang also visited the former Nationalist presidential office, where he signed a guestbook with the phrase "ice-breaking journey."
Both the KMT and the communists see his five-day trip as sealing a reconciliation. They have found common cause in uniting Taiwan with China and their dislike for President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁).
Meanwhile, Chinese academics yesterday said in Hong Kong's Wen Wei Po that the time was not yet "ripe" for chairman of the National People's Congress' Standing Committee Wu Bangguo (吳邦國) to visit Taiwan, but said that Taiwan was taking the initiative in cross-strait relations by paying visits to China.
KMT Legislative Speaker Wang Jing-pyng had proposed sending a delegation to China to invite his Chinese counterpart to Taiwan on Tuesday.
EUROPEAN TARGETS: The planned Munich center would support TSMC’s European customers to design high-performance, energy-efficient chips, an executive said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said that it plans to launch a new research-and-development (R&D) center in Munich, Germany, next quarter to assist customers with chip design. TSMC Europe president Paul de Bot made the announcement during a technology symposium in Amsterdam on Tuesday, the chipmaker said. The new Munich center would be the firm’s first chip designing center in Europe, it said. The chipmaker has set up a major R&D center at its base of operations in Hsinchu and plans to create a new one in the US to provide services for major US customers,
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
BEIJING’S ‘PAWN’: ‘We, as Chinese, should never forget our roots, history, culture,’ Want Want Holdings general manager Tsai Wang-ting said at a summit in China The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday condemned Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時媒體集團) for making comments at the Cross-Strait Chinese Culture Summit that it said have damaged Taiwan’s sovereignty, adding that it would investigate if the group had colluded with China in the matter and contravened cross-strait regulations. The council issued a statement after Want Want Holdings (旺旺集團有限公司) general manager Tsai Wang-ting (蔡旺庭), the third son of the group’s founder, Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), said at the summit last week that the group originated in “Chinese Taiwan,” and has developed and prospered in “the motherland.” “We, as Chinese, should never
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying