Mainland Affairs Council Chairman Joseph Wu (
Wu made the comments in response to Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's (
Wen addressed the end of China's annual parliamentary session yesterday, saying that China was watching Taiwan closely and preparing for any possible consequences of President Chen Shui-bian's (
Chen was "creating trouble to deflect attention, creating discord on the island and tensions across the Taiwan Strait," Wen said.
The Chinese premier also accused the prospective constitutional reform in Taiwan as being a move toward de jure independence.
Democratic projects
In response, Wu said the government's decision to cease the function of the NUC and the guidelines as well as the constitutional reengineering project "are major undertakings within the democratic political structure. But obviously the Chinese government has no clue at all how democracy works in Taiwan."
"The People's Republic of China dares not to practice democracy and therefore, it has no standing at all to criticize [the democratic practices in Taiwan]," Wu said in a statement released by the MAC yesterday.
Wu said the "one China" principle is the biggest "saboteur" of the cross-strait "status quo" and that China's relentless threat to use force against Taiwan is destabilizing the East Asian region.
"The `Anti-secession' Law China passed on March 14 last year is the hard proof to the world of China's attempts to use force against Taiwan," Wu said.
Wu called on the Chinese government to give up the threat to use force against Taiwan and cease the application of its Anti-Secession Law. He also urged Beijing to abandon the "one China principle" and start political reforms immediately.
Call for dialogue
Also yesterday, the Chinese premier urged the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to give up its pro-independence platform in order to enter talks with China.
"No matter what party affiliation they may have, no matter who they are, no matter what they said or did in the past, as long as they are committed to the `one China' principle, we are ready to have dialogue ... with them, even including those people from the Democratic Progressive Party in Taiwan," Wen said.
"As long as the party is willing to give up its platform of so-called `Taiwan independence,' we are ... willing to have contact and consultation with them," Wen said.
But the DPP yesterday dismissed Wen's offer, saying the party's pro-independence stance was approved through a democratic process and could not be dropped so easily.
"They have no idea what democracy is," DPP Secretary-General Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) told a news conference. "If China does not embrace democracy, there will be no peace across the Taiwan Strait."
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