A delegation from China’s Hubei Province arrived in Taiwan yesterday to attend a series of cultural and business events throughout the week.
The delegation is being led by Hubei Deputy Governor Wang Xiaodong (王曉東), who said after arriving at the airport that he could already feel the passion and enthusiasm of Taiwan.
Wang said that the delegation’s visit is aimed at improving understanding through cultural and industrial exchanges organized by Taiwan’s Chinese National Federation of Industries as well as cross-strait exchange promotion groups in Hubei.
This is the 11th time the province and Taiwan have held a week-long event of this type.
Several activities, including a forum on Chinese medicine, a seminar on the care industry and a youth forum, are scheduled to take place in Taipei, Miaoli, Greater Taichung, Greater Tainan, Chiayi City and Greater Kaohsiung, the organizers said.
Taiwan has seen a steady resumption of visits by Chinese provincial and municipal officials, which were previously curtailed as a result of the Sunflower movement, which was started in March by activists opposed to the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government’s handling of the controversial service trade agreement between Taiwan and China.
An earlier delegation led by Guizhou Province Chinese Communist Party Chief Zhao Kezhi (趙克志), who arrived on April 28, marked the first such visit since the end of the protesters’ occupation of the legislature, on April 10.
In addition to provincial delegations from Jilin, Hainan and Jiangsu, other notable visitors scheduled to arrive this month include officials from the Chinese Ministry of Culture, as well as Zhou Zhihuai (周志懷), head of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences’ Institute of Taiwan Studies.
Zhou, who was appointed to head one of China’s major think tanks on Taiwan affairs late last year, is set to attend the third Love and Peace Forum in Taipei on Thursday.
Other notable guests invited to attend the forum include Liu Guoshen (劉國深), head of Xiamen University’s Taiwan Research Institute, Hong Chi-chang (洪奇昌), a former chairman of the Straits Exchange Foundation, and Wu Shu-min (吳樹民), former president of the pro-independence Taiwan Society, the Taipei-based Love and Peace Foundation said.
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