Beijing was likely to be pleased with Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou's (
Beijing will now expect Ma to move swiftly toward renewing talks on building closer transportation and economic links, which have been frozen by Beijing for more than a decade, Peking University professor Niu Jun (牛軍) said.
"It seems to reflect the desire of Taiwanese voters to get cross-strait relations back on an even keel, which is something the mainland wants too," Niu said after it was announced that Ma was to replace President Chen Shui-bian (
There was no direct, immediate comment from the Chinese government or Chinese Communist Party on the election result. Niu said he did not expect any new initiatives from Beijing, saying the sides had already reached partial agreements when KMT politicians visited China.
"It's not a question of adjusting policy, but rather of consolidating the consensus already reached," Niu said.
Beijing suspended talks in part because of Taipei's refusal to recognize Beijing's "one China policy" under which Taiwan is considered a part of China.
China's official Xinhua news agency reported on Ma's victory in what it called Taiwan's "leadership election" -- reflecting Beijing's refusal to recognize the Taiwanese government.
Ma's win should be relatively palatable to Beijing because the KMT ostensibly favors unification between the two sides.
Beijing will also likely be happy at the failure of a pair of referendums on Taiwan's application to join the UN.
China has railed against the referendums, calling them a dangerous step toward independence and has rallied the US and other international powers in opposing it.
On Friday, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi (
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching