If cross-strait relations are to move forward, “the ball is now in Taiwan’s court,” China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) spokesman Ma Xiaoguang (馬曉光) said yesterday.
Ma was commenting on an overture from President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on an equal footing and without any preconditions.
In an exclusive interview with Agence France-Presse on Monday, Tsai said there is still a chance for the two sides to sit down and talk, despite escalating tension across the Taiwan Strait.
Photo: CNA
China’s stance on the “1992 consensus” and its opposition to Taiwanese independence remain firm and consistent, Ma said.
The “1992 consensus” defines the fundamental nature of cross-strait relations and ensures their peaceful development, he said.
Ma also commented on the appointment of former Presidential Office deputy secretary-general Yao Jen-to (姚人多) as vice chairman and spokesman of the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF).
Yao’s appointment to that “working-level” position has been seen by Beijing as an attempt to get in closer contact with China, as official channels of communication have been cut since Tsai’s inauguration in May 2016.
In Taiwan, Yao is known as a competent communicator, Ma said, adding: “If so, he is supposed to know the password for resuming communication between the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits [ARATS] and the SEF.”
ARATS is the SEF’s counterpart.
Yao declined to respond to a request to comment on Ma’s remarks about him, because he is not to assume the SEF post until July 9.
The SEF and ARATS were set up in the early 1990s as semi-official organizations dealing with day-to-day problems arising from increasing economic, social, cultural and tourism exchanges across the Taiwan Strait.
The so-called “1992 consensus” refers to a tacit understanding between the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Beijing that both sides of the Taiwan Strait acknowledge there is “one China,” with each side having its own interpretation of what “China” means.
Former Mainland Affairs Council chairman Su Chi (蘇起) in 2006 said that he had made up the term in 2000.
During the eight years that former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) was in office, China appeared comfortable with each side of the Taiwan Strait interpreting what “one China” means, an ambiguity and flexibility that allowed exchanges to flourish under a string of agreements signed by the two sides, including the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement.
Beijing has repeatedly said that the “1992 consensus” is the political foundation on which all cross-strait exchanges must be conducted.
China cut all official communication with Taiwan on the grounds that the Tsai administration does not recognize the “1992 consensus,” although it recognizes the “historical facts of 1992.”
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