Kaohsiung Mayor Han Kuo-Yu’s (韓國瑜) 1988 master’s thesis showed that the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) presidential candidate was highly critical of China’s ambition to annex Taiwan, the Taiwan Association of University Professors said yesterday.
Han’s thesis on the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) unification strategies, published when he graduated from National Chengchi University’s Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies, featured many ideas about cross-strait relations that would be considered advanced at the time, association president Lai Cheng-chang (賴振昌) told a news conference.
For example, Han wrote that the “one country, two systems” formula was unconstitutional and would lead to conflicts in the judicial system, Lai said.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
Describing the CCP as “a brutal giant holding a spiked club behind its back while smiling,” the thesis also warned against the aggressive nature of the CCP’s unification strategies under its seemingly harmless appearance, and maintained that the nation must have strong defense capabilities, Lai said.
“Judging from his arguments at the time, Han would have been a big fan of President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), because she is implementing many of his ideas,” he said.
It is bewildering that Han would go into the Hong Kong Liaison Office, since he was apparently opposed to the communists when he was younger, Lai said, referring to Han’s visit in March, which made him the first Taiwanese official to visit the office.
“I hope Han would return to the right path,” Lai said, adding that the mayor is either fooling the public or himself.
Han mentioned in his thesis that under the “one country, two systems,” fugitives could be transferred from Hong Kong to other parts of China for trial, Southern Taiwan Society director Weng Ming-chang (翁銘章) said.
In a way, “Han was a prophet who foresaw the anti-extradition movement,” Weng said, urging the mayor to attend a rally in support of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protests in Kaohsiung on Sunday.
In response, Han’s campaign office said that Han has never changed his stance on cross-strait issues.
Some people have tried to distort Han’s cross-strait policy for political reasons, but Han’s thesis speaks for itself, it said.
Taiwan needs a pragmatic cross-strait policy that can safeguard the democracy, freedom and sovereignty of the Republic of China, it added.
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