The seventh annual forum between the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) will be held in early May in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, KMT officials said yesterday.
A delegation led by KMT Honorary Chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) is expected to represent the party at the so-called Cross-Taiwan Strait Economic and Cultural Forum. The KMT officials said Chengdu was chosen as the venue for this year’s event mainly to mark the third anniversary of the Sichuan Earthquake, which was an important milestone in the development of cross-strait relations.
In the aftermath of the magnitude 8 tremor that ravaged the Chinese province on May 12, 2008, there was an outpouring of donations from Taiwan for the victims. The gesture of kindness was later reciprocated by China, which provided Taiwan with similar assistance in the wake of deadly flooding caused by Typhoon Morakot in 2009.
The venue was chosen to remind people that besides political and economic issues, other issues related to the well-being of people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait were worth exploring, the officials said.
On the agenda of this year’s forum will be China’s 12th five-year economic plan, Taiwan’s “golden decade” plan and future cooperation between the two sides on the basis of the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement signed in June last year, they said.
Educational and cultural exchanges between young people will also be addressed, they said, adding that the two parties were also considering the possibility of including issues such as cross-strait cooperation on disaster prevention and nuclear safety on the agenda.
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