“Someone” had mistaken a comment by a US Department of State official as a gesture supporting the Democratic Progressive Party, a Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) official said on Friday.
Such a huge misunderstanding could be problematic, said former Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) vice chairman Kao Koong-lian (高孔廉), who also serves as a special consultant to KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) and as the director of the party’s Department of Mainland Affairs.
At a Brookings Institute event titled “Taiwan: A vital partner in East Asia,” held on May 21 in Washington, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Susan Thornton commended what she described as the firm foundation of dialogue and exchange that has been established between Taiwan and China, and said that Taiwan, China and even the US have benefited from warming relations across the Taiwan Strait.
The US supports stable and positive interactions continuing across the Strait, she added.
However, Thornton said that defining that foundation is not “something that the US is in the business of elaborating.”
Thornton’s comments do not reflect the US stance on the so-called “1992 consensus,” Kao said, adding that the US has no interest in taking an official position on the matter.
While the US had long held a “one China” policy, it has never openly talked about its “one China” principle, Kao said.
The opposition party’s cross-strait relations platform of maintaining the “status quo” is for Taiwan to steer clear of unification with China, but also refrain from declaring independence, Kao said.
While voices against unification are growing strident, Kao asked whether voices against declaring independence would be stifled in the future.
Kao went on to call the “1992 consensus” a foundation that has enabled great leaps in cross-strait relations.
Without the “1992 consensus,” Taiwan would have little chance of participating in the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership and the cross-strait trade in goods and trade in service agreements, Kao said.
Kao’s comments were made ahead of DPP Chairperson and presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) 12-day visit to the US.
Tsai arrived in Los Angeles on Friday.
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