The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday said it would demand a correction after a Chinese-language report by Deutsche Welle (DW) quoted President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) as saying he aims to learn from the experience of East Germany and West Germany in handling bilateral relations and “their ultimate unification.”
The story was picked up by Taiwanese media outlets, which raised questions whether Ma was pushing for a similar unification between Taiwan and China.
The president met Beijing-based correspondents for Deutsche Presse-Agentur (DPA), German newspaper Allgemeine Zeitung and French newspaper Le Figaro at the Presidential Office on Monday.
Photo: Chang Chia-ming, Taipei Times
The meeting was first described as a “joint interview,” but Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Vanessa Shih (史亞平) yesterday said that it was not a “special interview,” but a “meeting with the media.”
According to DW’s Chinese-lanugage report and a German report by the DPA, Ma told the reporters that there is something to learn from the two German states’ handling of their bilateral relationship for the rapprochement between Taiwan and China. Bilateral communication led to the signing of the Basic Treaty in 1972 between West Germany and East Germany, and “it was a good step,” Ma was quoted as saying.
Ma was referring to the Permanent Mission set up by the Federal Republic of Germany in the German Democratic Republic, which he believed to be similarly possible between Taiwan and China, where mutual representative offices could be set up, the reports said.
However, the relationship between the two German states, which was based on the principle of “two states, one nation,” cannot be directly applied to the cross-strait situation, Ma reportedly said.
That is because the cross-strait relationship is not a “state-to-state” relationship, but neither is it an “in-state” relationship, Ma reportedly said.
“It’s a relationship that has until now never existed before in history,” he was quoted as saying.
However, the DPA’s English-language report on the meeting did not include any reference to Ma talking about the two German states as a model; instead, it focused on Ma’s hope to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Beijing in November.
Neither did the DPA report in German mention the word “unification” — unlike DW’s Chinese report, which led with the statement that according to Ma: “He is willing to learn from how the two German states handled their bilateral relationship and achieved ultimate unification.”
“What the president was underlining was the peace that could be maintained by the setting up of mutual representative offices, as was done in the two German states,” Shih said yesterday.
“And the ultimate unification he referred to was one between the two German states, not that [Taiwan and China] are going to achieve unification via the German model,” she added.
Shih said the report was “mistaken and came up with its own interpretation” of what the president was talking about.
“Because DW’s report is in Chinese, our media have therefore also transcribed the mistake,” she said.
Shih said the Presidential Office is working on a word-by-word transcript of the talk and the ministry would demand a correction from DW when the transcript is completed.
Despite the clarification, Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Hsiao Bi-kim (蕭美琴) slammed Ma’s denial of the similarities between the relationship between the two German states and that between Taiwan and China, calling it the president’s “self-denial” of the possibility that Taiwan and China could “join international organizations side by side.”
‘NO SECURITY RISK’: The Railway Bureau reassured the public that the technicians’ activities were limited to technical guidance and did not involve sensitive systems The Railway Bureau yesterday said it had invited eight Chinese technicians to assist with an airport MRT construction project. The bureau issued the confirmation after an Internet user said Chinese nationals had entered the construction zone of Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport’s Terminal 3 project. They asked why “individuals from an enemy state” were allowed access to such a major national infrastructure project, which raised serious concerns over Taiwan’s industrial safety, sensitive systems and information security. The bureau’s Northern Region Engineering Branch Office said subcontractor Taiwan Handle Industrial Co (台灣手把工業) of the Taoyuan airport MRT’s “Contract No. CU05 Project A14 Station Civil, MEP &
The National Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology yesterday showcased its locally developed variants of the Vision 60 robotic patrol dog, which it plans to deploy on the nation’s outlying territories in the South China Sea. The variants were produced under the Joint Lab project — created by the institute and domestic companies — and assembled with domestically produced motors, lenses and artificial intelligence (AI) systems alongside licensed tech from the US, Missile and Rocket Systems Research Division deputy director Jen Kuo-kang (任國光) told the media event at a military base in Taipei’s Dazhi (大直) area. Taiwan has built up its strengths
NOT IMMEDIATE: Taiwan has a chance to appeal the proposed 10 percent tariff before it starts, while other countries face a 12.5 percent tariff from the trade office Taiwan is among 60 economies determined by the US to have failed to impose or enforce a ban on the importation of goods produced with forced labor, according to a notice released on Tuesday by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), which proposed imposing an additional 10 percent or more tariff on them. The USTR in a statement said that following an investigation, it had determined under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 that the failure of the 60 economies to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labor is
TIT-FOR-TAT: The US allegedly revoked the visa of a Chinese national working at Xinhua News Agency in the US in response to Beijing’s expulsion of Vivian Wang The Presidential Office yesterday condemned China for expelling a New York Times correspondent from Beijing following the newspaper’s interview with President William Lai (賴清德), saying the move highlighted Beijing’s suppression of press freedom and its threat to international news media. Taiwan has noted a series of recent incidents in which Beijing used similar tactics to “threaten and pressure international media outlets and journalists,” Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said in a statement. “This concerns not only press freedom and freedom of expression, but also the safety of journalists, and Taiwan and relevant partners are paying close attention to the situation,” she
RSS