Highlighting the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) changed stance toward China, Vice President Annette Lu (
"When the KMT was the ruling administration, it used people's money and urged them to join it in opposing Communist China; yet after becoming the opposition party, it has taken the lead in asking Taiwanese people to forge closer ties with Communist China," Lu said yesterday.
Lu made the comments in response to a media inquiry about her view on Lien's proposed visit to China.
"If forging closer ties with Communist China is right, is this then tantamount to saying that [the party] was wrong when it in the past been calling Taiwanese people to go against Communist China?" Lu said.
"Lien, who previously served as vice president and premier, and is now KMT chairman, should come forward and give a clear explanation to the Taiwanese people," she added.
Many Taiwanese businessmen who have invested in China have met with difficulties, Lu said, adding that "Lien is not only encouraging more people to get into the hot pot, but is also himself producing more hot pots."
Lu made the remarks in reference to the recent popular use of an expression that depicts Taiwan as a frog being slowly cooked in China's "unification hot pot."
The image means to convey the idea of China slowly turning up the heat on Taiwan regarding unification, while at the same time adding incentives to the "pot" such as its growing market, cheap labor, preferential treatment and economic integration, to keep the "frog" from jumping out of the pot.
In response to Lu, KMT spokesman Chang Jung-kung (
Lu went to China in 1990 to visit her family's ancestral home in Nanjing County, Fujian Province.
"The KMT's past policies against the Communist Party defended the safety and security of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu. With the changes in the international situation, since the 1990s cross-strait relations have tended toward interaction and negotiation. Annette Lu does not understand the times we are in today," the statement said, while adding that the government is isolating and "containing" Taiwan.
Furthermore, Lu herself went on a 26-day trip to China in 1990 without first reporting to the KMT administration of the time, Chang said in the statement.
At the time, Lu went to visit her ancestral home in Fujian Province; why can't Lien visit his ancestral home in China, Chang said.
Similarly, Cheng defended the KMT's past policies in the statement, saying that they had helped the local development of democracy in Taiwan.
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