The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday denied a media report that said KMT Chairman Wu Den-yih (吳敦義) was planning to lead a delegation of 15 KMT mayors and county commissioners to China after his three-year travel ban expires in May.
“The KMT solemnly declares that there is no such arrangement and it is too early to discuss the matter,” the KMT said in a news release in response to a report published on Thursday by the Chinese-language Mirror Media magazine.
The report cited an unnamed pan-blue camp member as saying that Wu was trying to replicate a 2016 visit by a pan-blue delegation composed of eight KMT and two independent local officials to China by leading a similar delegation after May 20 to pave the way for a potential presidential bid next year.
Photo: Wang Shan-yen, Taipei Times
As of May 20, Wu will no longer be subject to a three-year travel ban stipulated in the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), which states that officials who have handled classified information must obtain approval before leaving the country after they leave office.
The purpose of the trip would be to attend a KMT-Chinese Communist Party forum — which is normally an annual event, but has been suspended for the past two years — and to discuss both sides’ rhetoric on cross-strait relations, the report said.
KMT Mainland Affairs Committee director Chou Jih-shine (周繼祥) is still in talks with Beijing on the matter, it said, citing another source as saying that it was uncertain whether China would agree to resuming the forum, or a meeting between Wu and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平).
However, as three of the KMT’s more high-profile local heads — Kaohsiung Mayor Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) and Yunlin County Commissioner Chang Li-shan (張麗善) — do not plan to join Wu, the KMT leader’s trip to boost his electoral prospects might not go ahead, the report said.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
RSS