Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) promised yesterday that he would ask the government to revise the rules to facilitate visits to China by local government chiefs.
Liu agreed that the regulations should be modified in line with the recent changes in cross-Taiwan Strait relations, in order to facilitate city mayors and county magistrates who wish to visit China.
“The Executive Yuan will ask the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) and the Ministry of the Interior to address the issue as soon as possible,” the premier said during an interpellation session at the Legislative Yuan.
Taichung City Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) had been eager to fly to China on board a historic maiden nonstop charter flight from Taichung on July 4. On Thursday, however, MAC Chairwoman Lai Shin-yuan (賴幸媛) said that the mayor’s planned trip might not be possible.
“Although the central government has been considering easing the restrictions on visits to China by local government chiefs, the rules cannot be amended in time to allow for Hu to make the trip on July 4,” Lai said.
Hu, however, remained firm on the idea, saying that he would invite four city mayors and county magistrates from central Taiwan to accompany him on the China tour, if he is permitted to go.
He said that he would do his best to push the central government in Taipei to allow him to travel on the landmark cross-strait flight — the first since the two sides split at the end of a civil war in 1949.
The charter flight initiative, along with the admission of a significantly larger number of tourists from China, was one of President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) campaign promises.
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