Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators yesterday questioned the purpose of national security adviser Wang Yu-chi’s (王郁琦) trip to the US this month, only a week prior to DPP Secretary-General Joseph Wu’s (吳釗燮) visit, urging him to brief the legislature.
The Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) reported yesterday that Wang went to the US on March 22 for a five-day visit, one that came immediately before Wu’s departure from Taipei on Sunday.
The report said that Wang met with retired US officials and key think tank members in Washington, and spread false accusations about the DPP, including that the DPP is an obstacle to the development of cross-strait relations and that it was behind the Sunflower movement last year.
Wang said that the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) cross-strait policies have more public support and urged US officials and academics to “remind” the DPP to refrain from radical or unexpected moves on cross-strait relations, the report said.
Wang has denied the report, saying he was in the US to exchange views on cross-strait relations.
Despite Wang’s denial, the DPP caucus called on him to brief to the legislature.
“We wonder whether Wang criticized and made false accusations about the DPP in the US,” DPP caucus whip Tsai Chi-chang (蔡其昌) told a press conference at the caucus’ office yesterday. “The government should clarify it to the public whether Wang represented the Republic of China in work related to national security, or the KMT to make false accusations about the DPP. Was his trip paid by the government or the KMT?”
Tsai said that as Wang visited the US just days before China’s planned inauguration of the controversial M503 air route on Sunday, he should have expressed Taipei’s concerns about the route to Washington instead of bad-mouthing the DPP.
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