We Want Security, Int'l Participation, Taiwan's Ruling Party Tells China
Patrick Goodenough
International Editor
(CNSNews.com) - China on Thursday invited Taiwan to restart bilateral dialogue that has been suspended for almost a decade. The talks are expected to begin as early as mid-June.
The latest sign of a thaw in China-Taiwan relations came after the heads of the two countries' ruling parties met and discussed such sensitive matters as Taiwan's desire for security and "international space."
The chairman of Taiwan's nationalist Kuomintang (KMT) party, Wu Poh-hsiung, met with Chinese President Hu Jintao in Hu's capacity as head of the Communist Party.
The landmark meeting on Wednesday came shortly after Taiwan's new president, Ma Ying-jeou of the KMT, called for a "diplomatic truce" with the mainland in his inauguration address.
Their conflict goes back to 1949, when China's then-ruling KMT fled the mainland for Taiwan after losing a civil war to Mao Tse-tung's communists who established the People's Republic of China.
Beijing, which claims Taiwan as part of its territory, has successfully blocked most of Taiwan's efforts for recognition and participation in the international community, including its annual efforts to take part in World Health Organization (WHO) activities. China also refuses to have diplomatic relations with the handful of countries that recognize Taiwan's sovereignty.
The dispute across the Taiwan Strait is among the most potentially explosive irritants in China's relations with the United States: China has threatened to use force if necessary to prevent the self-ruled island from proclaiming formal independence, and the U.S. is committed under 1979 legislation to help Taiwan to defend itself against unprovoked aggression.
Security and freedom to operate in the international community are top concerns for many in Taiwan, and Wu's raising of the twin issues in his talks with Hu were groundbreaking.
Wu told a press conference after the meeting he told Hu that Taiwanese "need a sense of security, respect and a place in the international community," and that Hu had said that was understandable.
The official Xinhua news agency quoted Hu as saying that once suspended cross-Strait dialogue was resumed, the participation of Taiwanese in international activities would be discussed, with priority given to the WHO issue.
"I believe that if two sides can work together and create conditions, solutions will be found to these issues through consultation," Hu said.
The meeting between the two party leaders appeared warm, with Hu thanking Taiwan for its active response to this month's deadly earthquake in Sichuan province, which killed at least 68,000 people.
Wu recalled an earlier earthquake, in Taiwan in 1999 -- at a time relations were especially poor -- and said while neither side could promise there would be no natural disasters, "both of us can promise that, through our joint efforts, there will never be a war across the Strait."
(The 1999 earthquake cast China's attempts to isolate Taiwan into stark relief. Beijing demanded that international relief aid be channeled through the mainland, delaying its arrival. Taiwan's exclusion from the WHO was also a problem, and Taiwan complained that China had prevented regional WHO experts from visiting the scene. Taiwan argues that its WHO non-membership cost Taiwanese lives during outbreaks of diseases, including SARS in 2003 and an enterovirus epidemic in 1998.)
Under Ma's predecessor, Chen Shui-bian of the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), dealings with China were strained.
Hu said Wednesday that positive political changes in Taiwan provided an opportunity for improved relations.
He called for a resumption of talks between a semi-official Taiwanese body, the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), and a mainland counterpart, the Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS).
The two were set up in the early 1990s to handle exchanges in the absence of official contacts between the two governments. But after a fallout in 1999, negotiations were frozen and did not resume during Chen's eight years in office.
On Thursday, Xinhua reported that ARATS has sent SEF a letter inviting Taiwan to send a delegation for Jun. 11-14 talks to discuss visits by Chinese tourists to the island and the introduction of regular direct charter flights between the two.
Currently, anyone flying between the mainland and Taiwan must make stopovers in Hong Kong or in third countries.
The establishment of the so-called "three links" -- direct flights, trade and postal services -- is a priority for the new Ma government, which hopes the flights will begin this summer.
Military gesture possible?
DPP leaders expressed some reservations about the Hu-Wu meeting, warning that a political track between the KMT and Communist Party of China may not be as transparent and as subject to government monitoring as authorized SEF-ARATS negotiations.
DPP secretary-general Wang Tuoh said the KMT must protect Taiwan's sovereignty, national interest and security in dealing with China, while DPP chairwoman Tsai Ing-wen said the meeting between Wu and Hu could give the impression that the KMT party was trying to usurp the powers of Taiwan's executive branch of government.
Prof. Ralph Cossa, president of the Pacific Forum CSIS think tank, says Ma took a big political risk in reaching out to China in his inauguration address, and China needs to respond positively. The U.S. should encourage Beijing to make significant gestures sooner, rather than later.
Cossa predicted that Beijing would move forward on the "three links" and might make some type of military gesture, like drawing back some of the more than 1,000 missiles deployed along the Chinese coastline pointing towards Taiwan.
"The Chinese will move slowly before making concessions in the most important area of international space since they fear that it helps legitimize the separation of the two and makes Taiwan's status as a de facto country more apparent and acceptable," he said.
On the other side of the Strait, "Ma will face some opposition at home and also won't move too fast since he is trying to consolidate his political standing."
Cossa said that during recent visits to Beijing and Taipei, he found a genuine sense of optimism in both capitals.
But with China preoccupied with the aftermath of the earthquake and hosting the Olympic Games this summer, "we should not expect too much to happen too soon."
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