Top DPP leaders announced yesterday that they are to embark on party-diplomacy tours overseas in late November and early December -- including trips to the US and Europe -- to advocate the party's 2000 election policy guidelines, as well as to prove it can win the presidential election and successfully take over as the country's ruling party.
DPP presidential candidate Chen Shui-bian (
Meanwhile DPP chairman Lin I-hsiung (林義雄) announced separately yesterday that he would embark on a visit to meet academics, Congressmen and party leaders in Washington and New York.
Officials at DPP central headquarters revealed yesterday that Chen would make a speech on Dec. 6 at a well-known Public Lecture series, held at the London School of Economics (LSE).
"Chen was invited by Anthony Giddens, the dean of the school. And his topic will be "The Third Way for Taiwan: A New Political Perspective," according to a close advisor to Chen.
Anthony Giddens is well known as the architect of British Prime Minister Tony Blair's "Third Way" doctrine.
The school's Public Lecture usually invites top leaders from other countries, such as presidents or premiers, as well as scholars such as the winners of the Nobel Prize.
"Therefore, it is a really special, honored experience for the DPP, because Chen will be the first person to speak at the lecture in his status as a presidential candidate," said the advisor.
Chen is then scheduled to travel to the other two countries, for meetings with top leaders of the leader of the Liberal Party now leading a coalition government in the Netherlands.
Moreover, Chen will also meet with officials at the European Union in Brussels including Chris Patten, the former governor of Hong Kong and the current British representative to the EU.
"Chen will discuss the issue of `regional economic coordination' and `coalition government with those officials,'" said one DPP official.
Chen is to formally announce his planned trip today and will depart for Britain on Dec. 4. He is to return to Taiwan on Dec. 9.
DPP chairman Lin I-hsiung said that while in the US he would meet with US officials.
The meeting is being arranged by Richard Bush, the chairman of the American Institute in Taiwan.
"We have to let the international community understand our policies -- especially in the time before Taiwan's presidential campaign," Lin said.
Lin stressed that he would explain the DPP's policy guidelines -- that were publicized last week -- to friends in the US, especially its new China policy.
He said the briefings would point clearly to the differences between the DPP's and the KMT's stances.
One DPP International Affairs Department official said that Lin's first trip abroad as party chairman should be important, as many foreign politicians and scholars are interested in understanding the reason for the DPP's change in its China policy.
"Now we are advocating a review of President Lee Teng-hui's (李登輝) `Go slow, Be patient' (戒急用忍) principle, which Chen and most DPP leaders supported until last year. We have to persuade international leaders to accept our change in policy, which represents an improvement, while the KMT has maintained its outmoded ideology with regards to the cross-strait relationship," said Liu Shih-chung (劉世忠), the DPP's International Affairs deputy director.
Lin will begin his tour on Nov. 28, along with the party's representative to the U.S., Chiou Yi-jen (邱義??.
Lin plans to speak in both Washington and the Canadian capital of Ottawa, and is scheduled to return sometime after Dec. 6.
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