Basing Taiwan's diplomatic policy on the so-called "1992 consensus" would only lead Taiwan to "a dead end," President Chen Shui-bian (
Chen made the remark while addressing a group of supporters in Tainan City.
The "1992 consensus" refers to the idea of there being "one China" on each side of the Taiwan Strait, with both sides having their own interpretation of the situation.
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has said that the "1992 consensus" was agreed upon by the Chinese Communist Party and the then KMT government at a 1992 meeting in Hong Kong.
Chen's Democratic Progressive Party, however, has adamantly denied the existence of a "1992 consensus."
"[The idea of] basing diplomacy on the `1992 consensus' is tantamount to admitting Taiwan is part of China," Chen said. "[The consensus] is a policy of surrender, a dead end."
While Chen did not elaborate, his remarks came as an apparent response to a proposal by KMT presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou's (
Ma said he would use the "1992 consensus" as the basis to negotiate with China and to expand Taiwan's diplomatic relations with the international community if he were elected president next year.
Chen also said yesterday that Taiwan will refuse to compete with China's "checkbook diplomacy" despite the latest diplomatic setback over Costa Rica.
"Several days ago our former ally Costa Rica severed ties with us. There were many reasons for this, but the most important factor was China's offer of US$430 million to buy ties," Chen said.
"Taiwan can not afford such an enormous amount and even if we could, our countrymen would not accept it because Taiwan refuses to spend money unwisely," he said.
"China intends to snatch away all Taiwan's allies to block our participation in international politics and to eliminate all our bargaining chips so that Taiwan cannot survive in the international community," Chen said.
At a separate setting yesterday while speaking at the opening of a Taipei symposium on Taiwan's ties with South Pacific states, Vice President Annette Lu said (
China is trying to win Canberra and Wellington's cooperation against Taiwan, she said
Furthermore, Lu said, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (
Lu also criticized Costa Rican President Oscar Arias Sanchez, whom Lu said she had accompanied on a trip to Kinmen when he visited Taiwan in 2001.
Noting that Arias was the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1987, Lu said Arias has brought shame on himself for terminating his country's 63-year friendship with Taiwan in order to receive money offered by China.
Meanwhile, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Friday that a Chinese official's remarks that Hong Kong's high degree of autonomy was controlled by China indicated a "regression of Hong Kong democracy."
MAC spokesman Johnnason Liu (
Wu said that "the high degree of Hong Kong's autonomy comes solely from the authorization of the central government" and is not "inherent."
The amount of power the special administrative region of Hong Kong possesses is solely dependent on how much power the central government allows it, Wu said.
Liu said that since the return of the former British colony to Chinese rule in 1997, the authoritarian nature of the Chinese regime and what he described as the democratic system in Hong Kong have run contradictory courses.
Even though China proposed that "Hong Kong people rule Hong Kong and have a high degree of autonomy," the contradictions of the "one country, two systems" policy are all too apparent and conflicts resulting from the system have worsened, Liu said.
It has been a decade since Hong Kong reverted to China, but "the 10 years have passed in vain in terms of democracy," Liu said.
The international community, including Taiwan, is willing to offer Hong Kong assistance, but the demand for freedom in Hong Kong has become weaker, he said.
Costa Rica sent a group of intelligence officials to Taiwan for a short-term training program, the first time the Central American country has done so since the countries ended official diplomatic relations in 2007, a Costa Rican media outlet reported last week. Five officials from the Costa Rican Directorate of Intelligence and Security last month spent 23 days in Taipei undergoing a series of training sessions focused on national security, La Nacion reported on Friday, quoting unnamed sources. The Costa Rican government has not confirmed the report. The Chinese embassy in Costa Rica protested the news, saying in a statement issued the same
Taiwan’s Liu Ming-i, right, who also goes by the name Ray Liu, poses with a Chinese Taipei flag after winning the gold medal in the men’s physique 170cm competition at the International Fitness and Bodybuilding Federation Asian Championship in Ajman, United Arab Emirates, yesterday.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.
RSS