Vice President Annette Lu (呂秀蓮) yesterday dismissed the just-concluded Boao Forum for Asia as “nothing but a show” and a “united-front” tactic commonly used by Beijing.
“There is much for president-elect Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and vice president-elect Vincent Siew (蕭萬長) to learn before they are inaugurated,” she said.
“Thank God this forum happened before they were sworn into office. It would be a serious matter if they were pleased with themselves when things like this happened after they are inaugurated,” she said.
Lu made the remarks after appearing in court on a corruption charge brought against her for allegedly misusing her special allowance fund.
Lu yesterday criticized the local media for harboring unrealistic hopes based on the courtesies China extended to Siew during the forum and for blowing the significance and success of it out of proportion.
In related news, former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lin Cho-shui (林濁水) yesterday said that Siew should apologize to the public for visiting China using a “Taiwanese compatriot travel document.”
Lin said Siew, who just returned from the Boao Forum, owed the public an apology and should mail the “Taiwanese compatriot travel document” back to Beijing.
Lin said that Siew and Su Chi (蘇起), a former Mainland Affairs Council chairman who accompanied Siew to the meeting, did not dare ask Beijing to issue them a pass for special guests.
It was disgraceful that the two visited China on a “Taiwanese compatriot travel document,” he said.
Lin made the remarks during a forum organized by the Taiwan Thinktank yesterday morning to discuss the impact of the Boao Forum for Asia.
Lin said that Taiwan should always stand up to China, saying that Siew did the right thing by protesting against a press release issued by Beijing that wrongfully depicted the consensus reached at the meeting between Siew and Chinese Commerce Minister Chen Deming (陳德銘). China later admitted the mistake and retracted the “one China” principle from the statement.
Lin said the incident once again proved that China constantly created trouble, adding that the KMT should learn a lesson from the Boao Forum; that is, national sovereignty should never be sacrificed for the mere sake of realizing election promises.
Liu Shih-chung (劉世忠), deputy chief of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Research and Planning Committee, warned that the Boao Forum may confuse front-line diplomats as Ma had promised to take a more moderate stance toward Beijing.
Liu said it seemed that the Ma administration would attach more importance to cross-strait policy than foreign policy or even let cross-strait policy dictate foreign policy, which is bound to deliver a serious blow to overall foreign policy.
Warning that the Ma administration must heed “the real trouble lying ahead,” Liu said overly high expectations for the Boao Forum would only fall into the trap of China’s “carrot and stick” approach.
Deputy director of the DPP’s Department of International Affairs Lai I-chung (賴怡忠) said the Boao Forum was a “complete failure,” both in format and content.
China’s attitude toward Taiwan’s WHO bid this year and removal of the missiles targeted at the nation is the real test for its sincerity in improving cross-strait relations, he said.
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