The US has cautiously welcomed Monday’s meeting between Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), but has refused to comment on any details.
“We welcome steps on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to reduce tensions and improve cross-strait relations,” acting US deputy Department of State spokesperson Jeff Rathke said.
He had been asked directly for US government reaction to “these highest-level talks between cross-strait political parties.”
Rathke said the US encouraged authorities in Beijing and Taipei to continue their constructive dialogue, “which we believe has led to significant improvements in the cross-strait relationship.”
He said that the “content and the pace and the scope” of interactions should be acceptable to people on both sides of the Strait, “but we’ll leave those details to the people participating in those talks.”
Asked if the US supported Taiwan’s bid to join China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), Rathke said he had no comment about anyone wanting to participate in the proposed institution.
“The US view on the AIIB has been made quite clear,” he said.
“We consider it important that high standards of transparency be part of the AIIB’s approach,” Rathke added. “The president commented on this just last week, so I don’t have anything to add to that.”
Noting that Xi had commented that cross-strait relations had reached a new and important point, a reporter asked Rathke if the US had the same view.
“I’m not going to get into characterizing. We’ve seen progress and we welcome that and we encourage continued dialogue,” Rathke said.
He was asked if the US thought the so-called “1992 consensus” should act as a “point of reference” for the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) “so that it would be able to open its own dialogue with the mainland — particularly when the DPP chair is to visit the US.”
Rathke said that he would not comment on how such issues were approached within Taiwan, adding: “I think our support for improved cross-strait relations is clear.”
The so-called “1992 consensus” refers to a tacit understanding between the KMT and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that both sides acknowledge that there is “one China,” with both having their own interpretation of what “China” means. Former KMT lawmaker Su Chi (蘇起) in 2006 said he made up the term in 2000, when he was head of the Mainland Affairs Council.
DPP Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) is expected to visit Washington next month for a series of high-level meetings.
Tsai has said her basic principle toward cross-strait relations would be “maintaining the ‘status quo’” and that she will not provoke “contradictions, confrontations or conflicts.”
In an interview with Germany’s Deutsche Welle, Alan Romberg, director of the East Asia program at the Stimson Center in Washington, said that the Xi-Chu meeting had helped to re-establish KMT-CCP links at the top, and to “consolidate the conceptual framework underlying future cooperation.”
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