Birds, not missiles, should fly in the skies, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) today said in Shanghai, citing a World War I poem on the need to promote peace, even as China keeps up its daily military activities around Taiwan.
Cheng is in China on what she has called a "peace" mission to lessen tensions at a time when Beijing has stepped up military pressure against Taiwan.
China refuses to talk to President William Lai (賴清德), saying he is a "separatist." Lai's administration has called on Cheng to tell China to stop its threats, and says that Beijing should engage with the democratically elected government in Taipei.
Photo courtesy of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)
Speaking to reporters at Shanghai's Yangshan Port, Cheng said she was fond of how ancient Norse sailors described the sea as the "road of the whale."
"These words are spoken with such humility, and they are entirely right. What should fly in the sky are birds, not missiles. What should swim in the water are fish, not warships," she said in comments carried live on Taiwanese television stations.
Cheng, who flies to Beijing late today for a possible meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), also quoted, in English, part of John McCrae's World War I poem In Flanders Fields: "If ye break faith with us who die, We shall not sleep."
"We may not have been able to give our ancestors peace, but we can certainly still give peace to the people of today and the people of the future," she said.
Beijing has maintained its daily military activities around Taiwan despite Cheng's presence in China.
Six Chinese military aircraft and eight warships were detected around the nation in the 24 hours before 6am today, the Ministry of National Defense said this morning.
"The facts prove that the Chinese communists' military threat against Taiwan is intensifying," Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Michelle Lin (林楚茵) wrote on Facebook.
"Cheng Li-wun has been on her trip for two days, and the Chinese communists still have a knife at Taiwan's throat," Lin said.
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