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KMT mulls polls on UN membership, cross-strait flights

The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is considering plans to call for referendums on direct cross-strait flights and UN membership under the name "Republic of China" to be held concurrently with next year's presidential election, KMT lawmakers told a press conference yesterday.

"Right now they are both just options. The final decision will be made at the party's Central Standing Committee meeting [tomorrow]," KMT legislative caucus whip Hsu Shao-ping (徐少萍) said.

KMT Legislator Ting Shou-chung (丁守中) said that although direct flights would be beneficial to the economy, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) government has been boycotting relevant legislation.

Ting denied that the party came up with the referendum idea for the sake of countering the DPP, which has engineered two referendums.

"The policy of direct flights is practicable and the country's 23 million people can make the decision for themselves through a referendum," Ting said.

KMT Legislator Wu Yu-sheng (吳育昇) said that the DPP government has been using the "sovereignty issue" as an excuse for its failure to start negotiations on direct flights with China.

Asked for comment on the plans, Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) said he supported the idea.

However, Wang said, the only way to initiate a direct flight service would be through negotiation between the two governments, even if the public expressed support for it in a referendum.

The DPP legislative caucus yesterday blasted the KMT over its referendum plans.

Citing the controversy which arose from China's Olympic torch relay route as an example, DPP legislative whip Wang Sing-nan (王幸男) told a press conference that the key problem with direct cross-strait transportation was that China was very likely to define the transportation routes as domestic ones and hence belittle Taiwan's sovereignty.

Wang said the Olympic torch incident showed that China could also try to change the nation's title in an agreement on direct transportation to "Taipei, China."

"The right to decide the sovereignty of Taiwan lies in the hands of Taiwanese and we dare not abandon that right so easily," Wang said.
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