Premier Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) was evasive yesterday about speculation that the next round of cross-strait talks would take place in Shanghai in the middle of this month.
“We will make it public when the time is ripe,” he said.
Wu was responding to media inquiry about a report published by the Chinese-language United Daily News yesterday. The report quoted anonymous sources as saying that the meeting between Straits Exchange Foundation Chairman Chiang Pin-kung (江丙坤) and his Chinese counterpart, Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Chairman Chen Yunlin (陳雲林), would take place in Shanghai between June 15 and June 20.
Executive Yuan Spokesman Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) yesterday downplayed the report, saying that the time and place of the meeting would be jointly decided by both sides.
The media has speculated that Beijing decided to hold off on finalizing the date and venue of the fifth round of negotiations until the Referendum Review Committee decides on Thursday whether to approve a request by the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) to initiate a referendum on the proposed economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA).
Chiang said the Executive Yuan would not interfere in the review process.
Chiang announced that he would lead a delegation to meet with friends of Taiwan in the US and Canada to discuss the government’s major policies, including the proposed ECFA.
The Referendum Review Committee held a public hearing last Thursday to hear the pros and cons of the TSU’s proposal.
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) and the Ministry of Economic Affairs opposed holding a referendum on the proposed pact during the public hearing, saying the trade deal concerns tariffs and investment.
The two government representatives said a referendum was unnecessary because the trade pact would be reviewed by the legislature.
C.V. Chen (陳長文), head of the Red Cross Society of the Republic of China and a lawyer, recently urged the Executive Yuan’s Referendum Review Committee to address the issue of a proposed referendum.
He said in an open letter to committee members last week that the TSU’s “political maneuver is aimed at a loophole in the referendum law” and questioned the way the TSU had phrased the proposed question.
He suggested that committee members ask whether the TSU supports or opposes an ECFA and then insist that its question reflect the party’s stance. Otherwise, the committee should reject the proposal outright, he wrote.
Meanwhile, the MAC yesterday dismissed speculation that the next round of high-level cross-strait talks would take place this month in Shanghai.
MAC Deputy Minister Liu Te-shun (劉德勳) said the two sides had yet to discuss the time and place for the upcoming Chiang-Chen meeting.
He said both sides had held two rounds of negotiations on an ECFA and that they may need to hold one or two more. It has been the goal of the administration for the two sides to sign the trade deal during the first half of this year, he said.
One thing was sure, Liu said, the meeting would not include a sightseeing tour this time around.
Deputy Minister of Economic Affairs Hwang Jung-chiou (黃重球) yesterday said an ECFA was likely to be signed in the middle of this month if all goes smoothly. The proposed trade pact will be the main focus of the fifth round of cross-strait talks and is therefore expected to be signed during that meeting, Hwang said.
Minister of Economic Affairs Shih Yen-shiang (施顏祥) yesterday refused to comment on what progress has been made on the “early harvest list.”
However, he said during a business forum that China has become the major manufacturing center and the biggest consumer market in the world and that Taiwanese businesses in alliances with Chinese firms would see their value boosted when the pact was signed.
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