Flying shoes and empty water bottles greeted Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) as he returned from his three-day visit to China early yesterday morning, with protesters at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport taking aim at the party leader.
Led by the Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU) youth division, the protesters decried Chu’s trip as “selling out” Taiwan, saying that his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) betrayed national interests.
Security personnel used large black umbrellas to shield Chu from the projectiles as the KMT delegation crossed the arrival hall; other staff stopped protesters before they could take further action.
Photo: Yao Kai-shiou, Taipei Times
While police officers restricted most demonstrators to a small zone outside Terminal 2, others disguised as passengers entered the arrival lobby for closer demonstrations against Chu.
Chu’s flight was delayed and did not touch down until shortly after midnight yesterday.
TSU Department of Organization head Tsai Feng-wen (蔡豐文) said that the KMT has backpedaled on its past staunch anticommunist stance to please Chinese authorities, adding that Chu’s actions signify an abandonment of Taiwan’s national sovereignty.
Separately, the new Social Democratic Party (SDP) also lashed out at Chu’s Beijing visit, questioning the KMT chairman’s legitimacy as a representative to engage in negotiations with China on behalf of Taiwanese.
The cross-strait policies of President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration were evidently derived from conclusions made during the first KMT-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) forum in 2005, SDP legislative candidate Miao Po-ya (苗博雅) said at a news conference in Taipei.
“We can see that the KMT-CCP forum is clearly not simply a meeting between two political parties. Basically, they are determining the nation’s cross-strait policies in an under-the-table manner,” Miao said, adding that the forums fail to adhere to a democratic process.
“The KMT administration evidently aims to utilize such unofficial channels that remain free of public oversight to determine the development of diplomatic policies between the two nations,” Miao said.
SDP legislative candidate Lee Yen-jong (李晏榕) said that cross-strait talks should be conducted through intergovernmental channels between the Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China.
“Aside from a failure to distinguish between the party and the state, Chu’s vision of cross-strait treaties is one that bars citizens from participation,” Lee said.
She criticized the government’s proposed bill for an oversight mechanism for cross-strait treaties, saying that it prevents meaningful oversight and could not prevent the abuse of power.
She urged legislators to support a version of the bill submitted by civic groups, saying that the government’s draft contained a clause in which administrative orders related to cross-strait affairs can be automatically legalized if they are not reviewed by the legislature within three months.
Meanwhile, a coalition of pro-independence groups headed by the Northern Taiwan Society described Chu’s visit to China as a “black-box deal” that lacked transparency.
Taiwan Nation Alliance chairman Wu Shu-min (吳樹民) said that many people initially had high expectations of Chu, because when he was running for the KMT chairmanship late last year, he said he would look into the controversial issue of KMT party assets.
However, not only has Chu failed in his handling of the party’s assets, he is also selling out Taiwan to China, Wu said, referring to remarks Chu made during his meeting with Xi in which Chu described the so-called “1992 consensus” as both sides belonging “to one China, but with each side ascribing different contents and definitions to the concept of ‘one China.’”
Chu’s actions prove the slogan used during the Sunflower movement that: “Unless the KMT falls, Taiwan will never do well (國民黨不倒，台灣不會好),” Wu said.
Additional reporting by Chen Hui-ping
GEARING UP: An invasion would be difficult and would strain China’s forces, but it has conducted large-scale training supporting an invasion scenario, the report said China increased its military pressure on Taiwan last year and took other steps in preparation for a potential invasion, an annual report published by the US Department of Defense on Wednesday showed. “Throughout 2023, Beijing continued to erode longstanding norms in and around Taiwan by employing a range of pressure tactics against Taiwan,” the report said, which is titled “Military and Security Developments Involving the People’s Republic of China (PRC) 2024.” The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) “is preparing for a contingency to unify Taiwan with the PRC by force, if perceived as necessary by Beijing, while simultaneously deterring, delaying or denying
‘LAGGING BEHIND’: The NATO secretary-general called on democratic allies to be ‘clear-eyed’ about Beijing’s military buildup, urging them to boost military spending NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte mentioning China’s bullying of Taiwan and its ambition to reshape the global order has significance during a time when authoritarian states are continuously increasing their aggression, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) said yesterday. In a speech at the Carnegie Europe think tank in Brussels on Thursday, Rutte said Beijing is bullying Taiwan and would start to “nibble” at Taiwan if Russia benefits from a post-invasion peace deal with Ukraine. He called on democratic allies to boost defense investments and also urged NATO members to increase defense spending in the face of growing military threats from Russia
PEACEFUL RESOLUTION: A statement issued following a meeting between Australia and Britain reiterated support for Taiwan and opposition to change in the Taiwan Strait Canada should support the peaceful resolution of Taiwan’s destiny according to the will of Taiwanese, Canadian lawmakers said in a resolution marking the second anniversary of that nation’s Indo-Pacific strategy on Monday. The Canadian House of Commons committee on Canada-Chinese relations made the comment as part of 34 recommendations for the new edition of the strategy, adding that Ottawa should back Taiwan’s meaningful participation in international organizations. Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy, first published in October 2022, emphasized that the region’s security, trade, human rights, democracy and environmental protection would play a crucial role in shaping Canada’s future. The strategy called for Canada to deepen
TECH CONFERENCE: Input from industry and academic experts can contribute to future policymaking across government agencies, President William Lai said Multifunctional service robots could be the next new area in which Taiwan could play a significant role, given its strengths in chip manufacturing and software design, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman and chief executive C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said yesterday. “In the past two months, our customers shared a lot of their future plans with me. Artificial intelligence [AI] and AI applications were the most talked about subjects in our conversation,” Wei said in a speech at the National Science and Technology Conference in Taipei. TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, counts Nvidia Corp, Advanced Micro Devices Inc, Apple Inc and
RSS