The former director of the Presidential Office, Su Chih-cheng (蘇志誠) admitted yesterday that he served as a secret cross-strait envoy for former President Lee Teng-hui (李登輝).
Su's revelation followed a news report that claimed there were a series of talks held between the two sides, which paved the way for the historic meeting between the two sides in 1993.
The China Times reported that Nan Huai-chin (
Nan has consented to the release of photos that show Su meeting with Chinese envoys, including Beijing's top cross-strait negotiator Wang Daohan (
He also offered to reveal more information that would detail the nine meetings between envoys from both sides.
The newspaper also revealed that Cheng Su-ming (
She said yesterday that the earlier meetings "had really helped stabilize cross-strait relations."
Both were confidants of former President Lee and both had previously denied speculation regarding the secret talks held between 1988 and 1992.
Su admitted to paving the way to the first ever cross-strait talks held in Singapore in 1993, between China's Wang Daohan and his Taiwanese counterpart Koo Chen-fu (
"I raised the suggestion of having Koo-Wang talks in the hopes of institutionalizing exchanges between the two sides," Su said.
The reports said that in January, 1998, Beijing had instructed a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Jia Yibin (
Nan relayed a message to Taiwan that the then Chinese President Yang Shangkun (
Nan then helped arrange three meetings with secret Chinese envoys.
Wang, from China's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS), met with Su in June 1991, when both sides set the date of the first ever cross-strait talks as April 1993.
The New Party said on Wednesday that Lee should make public the records of the nine secret meetings and the list of all secret envoys.
It was a former New Party lawmaker Yok Mu-ming (
"We hope President Chen Shui-bian
Feng accused Lee of deceiving the PRC into thinking that he was anti-KMT in exchange for stability in cross-strait relations.
"According to my sources, Lee had told the PRC that he would topple the KMT if the Communists didn't like the party," Feng said.
Secretary-General of the Presidential Office Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) said in a press release yesterday that the new government would never use secret envoys in cross-strait dialogue and declined to comment on the operations of the previous government.
"I am not against cross-strait contacts but formal mechanisms for dialogue cannot be replaced by informal channels," he said.
In Beijing, Chinese Vice Premier Qian Qichen (
"Secret contact is a kind of contact ... it's nothing to be ashamed of, nor a black box operation," Qian said.
He declined to say whether Taiwan's new government has sent secret emissaries and said "even if they have, I would not be at liberty to tell you that."
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