People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (
"Soong's visit to China and the issue of a `special envoy' are two different matters," said Presidential Office Deputy Secretary-General James Huang (
NO ARGUEMENT
"However, if Soong mentions the 10-point agreement to the other side of the Strait, and says that [the consensus] represents President Chen's stance, I think no one will argue against it, since the 10-point consensus was signed by President Chen and PFP Chairman Soong," Huang said.
"As the 10-point consensus was signed by the two [Chen and Soong], it represents their stance. There is therefore no question as to who represents what," Huang said.
In view of Soong's planned visit to China -- in addition to the trip to be made by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Lien Chan (
The "United Front" refers to tactics and efforts employed by Beijing aimed at extending its influence in Taiwan to aid unification.
CONSISTENCY
Saying that the government has been consistent with regard to its stance on opposition parties' visits to China, Huang noted that the Presidential Office has encountered a lot of difficulty when trying to communicate with Lien about the China trip.
In comparison, the Presidential Office has maintained smooth contact with the PFP since Chen and Soong's establishment of the 10-point agreement this February, said Huang, adding that the PFP had informed the Presidential Office soon after it received the invitation from Beijing for Soong to visit China.
When asked for the possibility of holding a second meeting between the president and Soong, the Presidential Office deputy secretary-general said that while no substantial moves in such a regard have been undertaken, the Presidential Office has, however, been open about the idea of holding a second Chen-Soong meeting.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
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