Meanwhile, upon his arrival in Taipei yesterday, former US deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage said that he would most likely discuss the National Unification Council issue with Chen, although he was not too concerned about the issue himself.
Armitage said he could understand the reasoning behind Chen's decision, and that he did not expect the move to have any significant impact on cross-strait relations in the long run.
Beijing did not seem to be overreacting to Chen's move, and its response had been "what we expected," he said.
Prior to visiting Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (
"Any democracy can change its constitution if it has the support of the people. If Taiwan wants it, they can do it," he said in response to a question from reporters.
Additional reporting by Shih Hsiu-chuan
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