President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday warned China not to “humiliate” Taiwan in international forums and risk “wiping out” the mutual trust and goodwill that has built up during the past two years.
Ma’s warning, made in an interview with Central News Agency, marked the sternest reaction yet to a flare-up between China and Taiwan at the Tokyo International Film Festival last month.
Jiang Ping (江平), the head of the Chinese delegation at the festival, set off consternation in Taiwan after saying Taiwan should participate under the name “Taiwan, China” or “Chinese Taipei.”
“It took us a year and half to work out the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement [ECFA], which has received widespread praise,” Ma said.
“However, another Jiang Ping incident or two could instantly wipe out the achievement,” he said.
Ma said that despite the improved ties since he came to power in 2008, differences between Taipei and Beijing remain.
“The Jiang Ping incident is simply the tip of an iceberg,” Ma said, without elaborating.
He called on the two sides to set aside the existing sovereignty disputes and keep building mutual trust.
Ma’s comments were also in reference to former vice president Lien Chan’s (連戰) raising the issue of Taiwan’s international space at a meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) on the sidelines of the APEC leaders’ summit in Japan at the weekend.
Ma said he had concerns over China’s continued obstruction of the efforts by Taiwanese civic groups to participate in international events, emphasizing the importance of a “virtuous cycle” on this matter.
”Our NGOs have recently encountered harassment and obstruction from … China and this has upset many people [in Taiwan],” he said.
“It would be difficult to -improve cross-strait relations” if Taiwanese NGOs keep encountering obstruction by China at international events, Ma said, adding that these organizations are usually among the most active in Taiwan.
On Taiwan’s participation in international organizations, Ma put an emphasis on the virtuous-cycle theory, which he said would help deepen cross-strait ties.
At his meeting with Lien on Sunday, Hu did not give any guarantees, merely saying that “negotiations should be sought regarding Taiwan’s participation in international affairs … so that disputes can be avoided.”
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CNA
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday inaugurated the Danjiang Bridge across the Tamsui River in New Taipei City, saying that the structure would be an architectural icon and traffic artery for Taiwan. Feted as a major engineering achievement, the Danjiang Bridge is 920m long, 211m tall at the top of its pylon, and is the longest single-pylon asymmetric cable-stayed bridge in the world, the government’s Web site for the structure said. It was designed by late Iraqi-British architect Zaha Hadid. The structure, with a maximum deck of 70m, accommodates road and light rail traffic, and affords a 200m navigation channel for boats,
PRECISION STRIKES: The most significant reason to deploy HIMARS to outlying islands is to establish a ‘dead zone’ that the PLA would not dare enter, a source said A High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) would be deployed to Penghu County and Dongyin Island (東引) in Lienchiang County (Matsu) to force the Chinese military to retreat at least 100km from the coastline, a military source said yesterday. Taiwan has been procuring HIMARS and Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) from the US in batches. Once all batches have been delivered, Taiwan would possess 111 HIMARS units and 504 ATACMS, which have a range of 300km. Considering that “offense is the best defense,” the military plans to forward-deploy the systems to outlying islands such as Penghu and Dongyin so that
WHAT WAS ALL THAT FOR? Jaw Shaw-kong said that Cheng Li-wen had pushed for more drastic cuts and attacked him, just for the outcome to be nearly identical to his bill The legislature yesterday passed a supplementary budget bill to fund the purchase of separate packages of US military equipment, with the combined amount of spending capped at NT$780 billion (US$24.8 billion). The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) used their legislative majority to pass the bill, which runs until 2033 and has two main funding provisions. One was for NT$300 billion of arms sales already approved by the US for Taiwan on Dec. 17 last year, the other was for NT$480 billion for another arms package expected to be announced by Washington. The bill, which fell short of the NT$1.25
‘CLEAR MESSAGE’: The bill would set up an interagency ‘tiger team’ to review sanctions tools and other economic options to help deter any Chinese aggression toward Taiwan US Representative Young Kim has introduced a bill to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, calling for an interagency “tiger team” to preplan coordinated sanctions and economic measures in response to possible Chinese military or political action against Taiwan. “[Chinese President] Xi Jinping [習近平] has directed the People’s Liberation Army to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. China has a plan. America should have one too,” Kim said in a news release on Thursday last week. She introduced the “Deter PRC [People’s Republic of China] aggression against Taiwan act” to “ensure the US has a coordinated sanctions strategy ready should
RSS