A student delegation organized by the Ma Ying-jeou Foundation to visit China was castigated by a government official yesterday as undermining the government’s handling of cross-strait relations.
Ma Ying-jeou Foundation CEO Hsiao Hsu-tsen (蕭旭岑) on Friday headed a 30-person delegation to China’s Shandong Province, stating that only through exchanges could cross-strait relations be maintained and confrontation avoided.
The 17 measures recently announced by President William Lai (賴清德) were an administrative move that restricted rights and freedoms, and use anti-China ideology to malign the Republic of China (ROC) Constitution, he said, adding that such acts serve only to bring both sides closer to the brink of war.
Photo: Reuters
Hsiao was referring to measures Lai issued following a national security meeting on March 13, which stated that China is a "ostile foreign force" and that China's efforts to infiltrate Taiwanese society and sow division through influence operations had intensified. The measures include reinstating courts martial, tightening requirements for residents from China, Hong Kong, and Macau to obtain Taiwanese identifications, and limiting access to Taiwan for individuals with "United Front backgrounds," among others.
The official yesterday questioned why Ma and his aides had not spoken of China’s daily incursions to intimidate Taiwan, or condemned China when it last year announced 22 guidelines to penalize “die-hard” Taiwanese independence separatists, including the use of the death penalty.
“[Former president] Ma [Ying-jeou (馬英九)] and Hsiao had not mentioned China’s military intimidation against Taiwan, while they organize more cross-strait exchanges to promote peace. They are using students to visit China to carry out Beijing’s propaganda and ‘united front’ ploys. But Ma and Hsiao dared not ask the Chinese government to change their ways, and never asked Beijing to take a more friendly approach toward Taiwan,” the official said.
“Now is a very testing time for cross-strait relations, mainly because China has escalated its military intimidation, taking a hybrid warfare approach to ratchet up tensions against Taiwan. But Ma seems blind to all this. This latest Chinese visit is for Ma to help Beijing gloss over the military tension, to whitewash China’s hostile aggression in the region,” the official added.
Additional reporting by CNA
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