Taipei City Government’s working group on Chinese affairs is to be reorganized and made directly answerable to Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), city officials said yesterday.
The city’s Research, Development and Evaluation Commission chairman Chen Ming-shiun (陳銘薰) said that while the working group responsible for coordinating relations between the city and China was formerly subject to his commission, it would now report directly to the mayor.
The working group would meet next week to discuss policies and an action plan for relations with China, Ko said yesterday.
“I am opposed to secret envoys,” Ko said, adding that he hoped for an “open and transparent” dialogue with China.
Chen said the working group had mainly been responsible for organizing cross-strait events.
However, Ko said it would now serve as a “consultant” body to the city government on China policy.
Ko promised that the body would include a diverse array of figures from the pan-blue and pan-green camps, adding that former International Affairs Committee deputy director Jao Ching-yu (饒慶鈺) would head the group.
Taipei City Government spokesman Sydney Lin (林鶴明) said the group’s organization and membership would differ from that seen in former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin’s (郝龍斌) administration, with more details to be announced next week.
Ko’s comments follow a report on Web site Storm Media that group members would include noted cross-strait experts, including former Mainland Affairs Council chairmen Su Chi (蘇起) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Chen Min-tong (陳明通) of the Democratic Progressive Party.
Ko’s China policy has attracted speculation that he might have a possible cross-strait role as an independent politician through the annual Taipei-Shanghai forum.
While Ko has called for an expansion of the forum to include other cities, Shanghai Mayor Yang Xiong (楊雄) has said the forum can be held only on the foundation of the so-called “1992 consensus.”
Ko has not expressed agreement with the “1992 consensus,” instead saying that cross-strait ties should move forward on their existing foundation.
The “1992 consensus” refers to a supposed understanding between the KMT and the Chinese government that both Taiwan and China acknowledge there is “one China,” with each side having its own interpretation of what that means. In 2006, Su said he "formulated" the term “1992 consensus” in 2000 when he was Mainland Affairs Council chairman.
TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT: A US Air Force KC-135 tanker came less than 1,000 feet of an EVA plane and was warned off by a Taipei air traffic controller, a report said A US aerial refueling aircraft came very close to an EVA Airways jet in the airspace over southern Taiwan, a military aviation news Web site said. A report published by Alert 5 on Tuesday said that automatic dependent surveillance–broadcast (ADS-B) data captured by planfinder.net on Wednesday last week showed a US Air Force KC-135 tanker “coming less than 1,000 feet [305m] vertically with EVA Air flight BR225 as both aircraft crossed path south of Taiwan” that morning. The report included an audio recording of a female controller from the Taipei air traffic control center telling the unidentified aircraft that it was
A series of discussions on the legacy of martial law and authoritarianism are to be held at the Taipei International Book Exhibition this month, featuring findings and analysis by the Transitional Justice Commission. The commission and publisher Book Republic organized the series, entitled “Escaping the Nation’s Labyrinth of Memory: What Authoritarian Symbols and Records Can Tell Us,” to help people navigate narratives through textual analysis and comparisons with other nations. The four-day series is to begin on Thursday next week with a discussion between commission Chairwoman Yang Tsui (楊翠), Polish-language translator Lin Wei-yun (林蔚昀), and Polish author and artist Pawel Gorecki comparing
MOVING OUT: A former professor said that rent and early education costs in Taipei are the nation’s highest, which makes it difficult for young people to start families The population of Taipei last year fell to the lowest in 23 years due to high rent, more transportation options and the expansion of northern cities into a single metropolis, academics and city officials said on Monday. Data released this month by the Ministry of the Interior showed that the capital was home to 2,602,418 people last year, down 42,623 from 2019. The decline is second only to 1993, when the population fell by 42,828 people, while Taipei’s population was the lowest it has been since 1997. Taipei saw the biggest drop among the six special municipalities, while Taoyuan led the group in
A legislator yesterday called for authorities to investigate the sale of Chinese-made, Internet-connected karaoke machines containing “propaganda songs.” Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chen Ting-fei (陳亭妃) said she was approached by a person who had discovered Chinese patriotic songs such as My Motherland (我的祖國) — which is commonly referred to as China’s “second national anthem” — in Chinese-made karaoke devices sold in Taiwan. The machines are popular, as they can connect to the Internet, providing access to thousands of songs, she said. One retailer, who asked to remain anonymous, said that the machines first entered the local market about three years ago, starting with