People First Party (PFP) Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜) has put an end to his short honeymoon with the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), denying President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) claims that he had vowed to throw his support behind the arms-procurement package or had opposed reforms to allow constitutional amendments via public referendums in exchange for an invite from Beijing to visit.
"I never promised to push through the arms-procurement package," Soong said in Beijing yesterday, stressing that he had never struck any deals with Chinese authorities to bring about his nine-day tour of China.
ALLEGATIONS
In a TV interview on Sunday, while Soong was in China, Chen claimed the PFP leader had struck a deal with director of Beijing's Taiwan Affairs Office, Chen Yunlin (
President Chen continued his commentary on Monday night, saying that Soong had vowed to push through key legislation, including the US arms-procurement bill, upon his return home.
The PFP has vehemently drejected the president's allegations.
While Chen Shui-bian and Soong had struck a cooperative tone with a joint 10-point consensus in late February, both men have taken steps this past week to limit their collaboration.
Yesterday Soong made it clear that he was touring China in his capacity as the head of the PFP, not as a messenger for the president.
"I am here in Beijing today as the PFP chairman ... and we are thankful for this opportunity to conduct party-to-party dialogue with the Chinese Communist Party [CCP]" Soong said upon his arrival in Beijing from Changsha yesterday afternoon.
`NO PROMISES'
"My interaction with President Chen resulted in his blessings for this trip, and now, his remarks in the opposite direction ... but there was no promise that I would be given any special positions or other privileges," Soong told reporters at the airport.
Soong was given a high-profile reception at the airport. Chen Yunlin greeted him with a handshake as he stepped off the airplane and onto the red carpet. A group of 100 Beijing schoolchildren bearing bouquets of flowers had chanted a welcome while a red banner reading "We Welcome the People First Party Delegation" was raised.
``So long as people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait are as close as one family, then we can find a solution to the problem,'' Soong said. ``Both sides of the Taiwan Strait are looking forward to a breakthrough, to mutual cooperation and understanding.''
Soong is due to give a speech at Tsing Hua University and meet with Chinese Vice President Zeng Qinghong (
He is due back in Taiwan on Friday morning.
Soong had called for closer ties between the two sides earlier yesterday in a speech at Hunan University.
``We all have a common responsibility to advance cross-strait ties,'' Soong said. ``All of the sons and daughters of the Chinese nation are watching to see if we can shoulder this responsibility.''
Soong said he hoped his meeting with Hu would ``break the ice'' and contribute to a peaceful resolution of tensions between Beijing and Taipei.
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to
A relatively large earthquake may strike within the next two weeks, following a magnitude 5.2 temblor that shook Taitung County this morning, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. An earthquake struck at 8:18am today 10.2km west of Taitung County Hall in Taitung City at a relatively shallow depth of 6.5km, CWA data showed. The largest intensity of 4 was felt in Taitung and Pingtung counties, which received an alert notice, while areas north of Taichung did not feel any shaking, the CWA said. The earthquake was the result of the collision between the Philippine Plate and the Eurasian Plate, the agency said, adding
Snow fell in the mountainous areas of northern, central and eastern Taiwan in the early hours of yesterday, as cold air currents moved south. In the northern municipality of Taoyuan, snow started falling at about 6am in Fusing District (復興), district head Su Tso-hsi (蘇佐璽) said. By 10am, Lalashan National Forest Recreation Area, as well as Hualing (華陵), Sanguang (三光) and Gaoyi (高義) boroughs had seen snowfall, Su said. In central Taiwan, Shei-Pa National Park in Miaoli County and Hehuanshan National Forest Recreation Area in Nantou County saw snowfall of 5cm and 6cm respectively, by 10am, staff at the parks said. It began snowing
The 2025 Kaohsiung Wonderland–Winter Amusement Park event has teamed up with the Japanese manga series Chiikawa this year for its opening at Love River Bay yesterday, attracting more than 10,000 visitors, the city government said. Following the success of the “2024 Kaohsiung Wonderland” collaboration with a giant inflatable yellow duck installation designed by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman, this year the Kaohsiung Tourism Bureau collaborated with Chiikawa by Japanese illustrator Nagano to present two giant inflatable characters. Two inflatable floats — the main character, Chiikwa, a white bear-like creature with round ears, and Hachiware, a white cat with a blue-tipped tail
RSS