The Chinese Ministry of Culture and Tourism yesterday announced its third batch of countries that Chinese tour groups can visit — with Taiwan conspicuously left out of the list.
Mainland Affairs Council Deputy Minister Jan Jyh-horng (詹志宏) said that the government has conveyed through various communication channels Taiwan’s sincerity and goodwill in promoting tourism, but so far there has been no positive response on China’s part.
China’s latest list covers 78 countries, including Japan, South Korea, the UK and the US.
Photo: Chung Li-hua, Taipei Times
As China reopened to the world, it announced its first list of target destinations for tour groups on Feb. 6 and its second list on March 10, which covered 60 countries.
China’s Taiwan Affairs Office on May 19 announced that Chinese travel agencies can host tour groups arriving from Taiwan, saying that the matter does not require cross-strait negotiations.
Taiwan, on the other hand, allows individuals to travel to China, but bans travel agencies from organizing group tours to China.
Minister of Transportation and Communications Wang Kwo-tsai (王國材) last month reiterated that both Taiwan and China must mutually show goodwill before normal cross-strait tourism could resume.
“We do not ban individuals from traveling to China, but China prohibits its own people from traveling to Taiwan individually or through package tours. They hope tour groups from Taiwan can come visit, and likewise we hope Chinese tour groups can come,” Wang told reporters.
Taiwan’s exclusion from the list is the result of deteriorating cross-strait relations and a lack of mutual trust, a Taiwanese tour operator told the Taipei Times on condition of anonymity.
While Beijing might have factored the upcoming presidential election into its consideration when it excluded Taiwan from the list, the operator said that both sides need to quickly resume negotiations through the Taiwan Strait Tourism Association and the Association for Tourism Exchange across the Taiwan Strait, which represent Taiwan and China respectively.
Both sides have already missed two great opportunities to break the ice and communicate with one another, the operator said.
For the Cross-Strait Summer Travel Fair in Taipei last month, which was held in conjunction with the Taipei International Summer Travel Expo, China was planning to send a delegation comprising officials and tourism operators from nine Chinese provinces.
Of the 212 members who were planning to attend, the Mainland Affairs Council only gave entry permits to 137 Chinese tour operators, staff members and entertainers participating in the travel fair, and denied entry to all Chinese officials, the operator said.
While travel agencies from China and Taiwan last week met in Hefei City in China’s Anhui Province for a conference, no representative from the Taiwanese government participated, the operator said.
CROSS-STRAIT COLLABORATION: The new KMT chairwoman expressed interest in meeting the Chinese president from the start, but she’ll have to pay to get in Beijing allegedly agreed to let Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) around the Lunar New Year holiday next year on three conditions, including that the KMT block Taiwan’s arms purchases, a source said yesterday. Cheng has expressed interest in meeting Xi since she won the KMT’s chairmanship election in October. A source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a consensus on a meeting was allegedly reached after two KMT vice chairmen visited China’s Taiwan Affairs Office Director Song Tao (宋濤) in China last month. Beijing allegedly gave the KMT three conditions it had to
STAYING ALERT: China this week deployed its largest maritime show of force to date in the region, prompting concern in Taipei and Tokyo, which Beijing has brushed off Deterring conflict over Taiwan is a priority, the White House said in its National Security Strategy published yesterday, which also called on Japan and South Korea to increase their defense spending to help protect the first island chain. Taiwan is strategically positioned between Northeast and Southeast Asia, and provides direct access to the second island chain, with one-third of global shipping passing through the South China Sea, the report said. Given the implications for the US economy, along with Taiwan’s dominance in semiconductors, “deterring a conflict over Taiwan, ideally by preserving military overmatch, is a priority,” it said. However, the strategy also reiterated
‘BALANCE OF POWER’: Hegseth said that the US did not want to ‘strangle’ China, but to ensure that none of Washington’s allies would be vulnerable to military aggression Washington has no intention of changing the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait, US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said on Saturday, adding that one of the US military’s main priorities is to deter China “through strength, not through confrontation.” Speaking at the annual Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California, Hegseth outlined the US Department of Defense’s priorities under US President Donald Trump. “First, defending the US homeland and our hemisphere. Second, deterring China through strength, not confrontation. Third, increased burden sharing for us, allies and partners. And fourth, supercharging the US defense industrial base,” he said. US-China relations under
The Chien Feng IV (勁蜂, Mighty Hornet) loitering munition is on track to enter flight tests next month in connection with potential adoption by Taiwanese and US armed forces, a government source said yesterday. The kamikaze drone, which boasts a range of 1,000km, debuted at the Taipei Aerospace and Defense Technology Exhibition in September, the official said on condition of anonymity. The Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology and US-based Kratos Defense jointly developed the platform by leveraging the engine and airframe of the latter’s MQM-178 Firejet target drone, they said. The uncrewed aerial vehicle is designed to utilize an artificial intelligence computer
RSS