Independent presidential candidate James Soong (
Before reaching such a consensus, however, Soong said he would ask his vice president, Chang Chao-hsiung
Soong also said he would not rule out the possibility of sending a member of the DPP to China as a cross-strait envoy.
Soong said he would be willing to visit the US, Japan and ASEAN countries as president-elect before the May 20 inaugural ceremony.
"The future leader of Taiwan is not only responsible for the well-being and security of the people of Taiwan, he also has international obligations to maintain peace and stability in the region," Soong said.
"After I am elected president of the Republic of China, I will not only be the favored leader here but also a favored leader of the region," he added.
Soong said the Taiwan Strait has been pegged as "the most likely hot spot for war," but that "politics is the art of the possible."
"While the political dispute cannot be settled at once, I would like to use cultural and economic approaches to promote a friendly atmosphere, in the hopes of pushing through a 30- to 50-year peace accord under the auspices of international witnesses," he said.
Soong has said he would, under the auspices of the international community, push for the signing of a 30-year peace agreement to bring security to the Strait.
Soong also took the opportunity to launch a verbal attack against President Lee Teng-hui's
"It couldn't be more obvious that Lee's formula is not welcomed by the international community," Soong said.
"As a state leader, while he struggled to ensure national security and the people's dignity, he also had to strike a balance between maintaining sovereignty and avoiding an unnecessary armed conflict with China," Soong said.
Despite the fact that both the KMT's Lien Chan
"If China refuses to respect the dignity of the Taiwanese, I would not visit China if I am elected. If Taiwan's people fail to iron out their differences, what subject can we talk to the Chinese about?" he said.
Soong then turned his attention to the president of the Academia Sinica, Lee Yuan-tseh
Lee has offered to act as a cross-strait envoy if Chen is elected.
"Everybody knows that when strong acid meets with a strong base, it will have a strong reaction. Lee himself is a prominent chemist, so he should understand such logic," Soong said.
Soong also said that his national affairs conference would determine the nature of the message that was to be conveyed across the Strait.
"I would not deny the possibility of sending DPP or independent representatives to negotiate with China," Soong added.
Soong also said the current "dump-save" effort indicated that the KMT's presidential candidate has been rejected by most voters.
"The so-called `dump-save' tactic resulting from Lee Yuan-tseh's endorsement of Chen was a feeble attempt to push me out, since Lien's popularity rating has never been over 20 percent," Soong said.
He said that he remains confident of victory.
Meanwhile, in a related development, KMT legislator Chin Hui-chu
Chin's endorsement appeared to come as no surprise to KMT headquarters, since Chin had been included in a party "blacklist" and was waiting to be expelled from the party over suspicions of supporting Soong.
AGING: As of last month, people aged 65 or older accounted for 20.06 percent of the total population and the number of couples who got married fell by 18,685 from 2024 Taiwan has surpassed South Korea as the country least willing to have children, with an annual crude birthrate of 4.62 per 1,000 people, Ministry of the Interior data showed yesterday. The nation was previously ranked the second-lowest country in terms of total fertility rate, or the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime. However, South Korea’s fertility rate began to recover from 2023, with total fertility rate rising from 0.72 and estimated to reach 0.82 to 0.85 by last year, and the crude birthrate projected at 6.7 per 1,000 people. Japan’s crude birthrate was projected to fall below six,
US President Donald Trump in an interview with the New York Times published on Thursday said that “it’s up to” Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) what China does on Taiwan, but that he would be “very unhappy” with a change in the “status quo.” “He [Xi] considers it to be a part of China, and that’s up to him what he’s going to be doing, but I’ve expressed to him that I would be very unhappy if he did that, and I don’t think he’ll do that. I hope he doesn’t do that,” Trump said. Trump made the comments in the context
SELF-DEFENSE: Tokyo has accelerated its spending goal and its defense minister said the nation needs to discuss whether it should develop nuclear-powered submarines China is ramping up objections to what it sees as Japan’s desire to acquire nuclear weapons, despite Tokyo’s longstanding renunciation of such arms, deepening another fissure in the two neighbors’ increasingly tense ties. In what appears to be a concerted effort, China’s foreign and defense ministries issued statements on Thursday condemning alleged remilitarism efforts by Tokyo. The remarks came as two of the country’s top think tanks jointly issued a 29-page report framing actions by “right-wing forces” in Japan as posing a “serious threat” to world peace. While that report did not define “right-wing forces,” the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs was
PREPAREDNESS: Given the difficulty of importing ammunition during wartime, the Ministry of National Defense said it would prioritize ‘coproduction’ partnerships A newly formed unit of the Marine Corps tasked with land-based security operations has recently replaced its aging, domestically produced rifles with more advanced, US-made M4A1 rifles, a source said yesterday. The unnamed source familiar with the matter said the First Security Battalion of the Marine Corps’ Air Defense and Base Guard Group has replaced its older T65K2 rifles, which have been in service since the late 1980s, with the newly received M4A1s. The source did not say exactly when the upgrade took place or how many M4A1s were issued to the battalion. The confirmation came after Chinese-language media reported
RSS