The ruling parties on both sides of the Taiwan Strait agreed on Sunday to “make efforts to avoid mutual attrition” on the international stage. This was part of 17 “common views” reached between the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) at the end of their annual two-day cross-strait economic, trade and cultural forum, the eighth since it was launched in 2006.
In a joint statement read by KMT Vice Chairman John Chiang (蔣孝嚴), the two parties said that since cross-strait ties are not “state-to-state ones,” both sides should work hard to avoid “internal attrition” and instead should engage in practical negotiations on an equal footing when it comes to foreign affairs.
However, Chiang’s comments on nationhood represent the view among more conservative KMT members and have little appeal to the majority of Taiwanese, whose support for unification continues to drop as self-identification as Taiwanese and support for independence grows, even under President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration. Maintaining the status quo in the Taiwan Strait continues to have majority support among Taiwanese.
High on the list of their common views are their anti-Taiwan independence stance and stress on the so-called “1992 consensus” — an alleged tacit agreement between the two governments that there is only one China, whose meaning to be interpreted by each side.
Former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝), who was in office when the agreement is alleged to have been reached, denies the existence of the consensus.
Based on their common anti-Taiwan independence stance and their emphasis on the so-called “1992 consensus,” the two sides will continue to promote dialogue and negotiations as well as the institutionalization of cross-strait exchanges, Chiang said.
He said the KMT and the CCP saw the need to gradually push for the establishment of an “overall office” on each side to handle various types of affairs. Currently, China and Taiwan have tourism promotion offices across the Strait.
The two parties also agreed to speed up follow-up talks on expanding joint projects under the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), setting a target for the completion of talks on a trade services pact by the end of the year.
The two sides called for the signing of a cross-strait investment protection agreement as soon as possible, which is also part of a joint cooperation project under the ECFA that Taiwan considers an urgent task for protecting the interests of its business investors in China.
Other key points in the “common views” statement included calls for more extensive cultural exchanges between the two sides of the Strait and the institutionalization of such exchanges, including the sponsoring of a cross-strait cultural forum.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods