The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislative caucus yesterday urged Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) to clarify her stance on cross-strait relations.
The call came after former DPP chairman Hsu Hsin-liang (許信良) said the DPP should not exclude the unification option and that the idea of independence was outside the party’s mainstream opinion — comments that were criticized by several prominent DPP members, who affirmed the party’s platform upholding independence.
KMT legislators accused Tsai of being deliberately elusive on cross-strait issues to “trick Taiwanese.”
“If the DPP rejects the ‘1992 consensus’ and now also alleges that Taiwanese independence has not been its objective since its establishment, what is it that Tsai really stands for?” the caucus said.
KMT caucus whip Lai Shyh-bao (賴士葆) said that with Hsu’s remarks, combined with former Straits Exchange Foundation chairman and DPP legislator Hung Chi-chang’s (洪奇昌) call for the party to abandon its pursuit of de jure independence and the recent visit of DPP Department of Chinese Affairs Director Chao Tien-lin (趙天麟) to China, the DPP seems to be aiming to get Tsai off the hook on cross-strait relations.
“However, Tsai should make her stance clear: If not the ‘1992 consensus,’ then what?” Lai asked.
“People say that the KMT is now mired in ‘blue melancholy,’ but the DPP is likewise troubled by ‘green melancholy,’ which is embodied by Hsu’s remarks,” KMT Legislator Wu Yu-sheng (吳育昇) said.
“It is having trouble compromising its yearning for the presidency, playing with Taiwanese independence and [handling] its inability to deal with China,” Wu said.
“If it is really like what Tsai said — that the leaning toward independence is a ‘natural element’ encoded in Taiwanese youth — what was Hsu’s claim all about?” Wu said. “And while Chao went to China as a board member of the Straits Exchange Foundation, he sneaked away and came back [yesterday] before he could meet China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits Chairman Chen Deming (陳德銘) the next day [today].”
“Is Tsai trying to finagle the media voters’ support by making superficial moves?” Wu said.
“However, China has made it clear to them; as long as the DPP holds on to the idea of ‘one country on each side [of the Taiwan Strait]’ and Taiwanese independence, there is no possibility of a DPP-Chinese Communist Party forum,” Wu said.
Wu also referred to Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je’s (柯文哲) “2015 consensus,” calling it a new framework based on the “one China” concept that could acceptable to the DPP.
Ko’s “2015 consensus” says that cross-strait exchanges should be carried out “on the existing political foundation, under the principles of mutual awareness, mutual understanding, mutual respect and mutual cooperation, and in the belief that both sides of the Taiwan Strait are a close family.”
“We hope that the DPP would not turn its ‘green melancholy’ to ‘Taiwan’s melancholy,’” Wu said.
KMT Legislator Lin Yu-fang (林郁方) called the DPP hypocritical for not criticizing Ko’s comment that “‘one China’ is not an issue for him.”
The so-called “1992 consensus” refers to a tacit understanding between the KMT and the Chinese Communist Party that both Taiwan and China acknowledge there is “one China,” with each side having its own interpretation of what that means.
In 2006, then-KMT lawmaker Su Chi (蘇起) said that he made up the term in 2000, when he was Mainland Affairs Council chairman, before the transition of power from the KMT to the DPP.
‘DENIAL DEFENSE’: The US would increase its military presence with uncrewed ships, and submarines, while boosting defense in the Indo-Pacific, a Pete Hegseth memo said The US is reorienting its military strategy to focus primarily on deterring a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan, a memo signed by US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth showed. The memo also called on Taiwan to increase its defense spending. The document, known as the “Interim National Defense Strategic Guidance,” was distributed this month and detailed the national defense plans of US President Donald Trump’s administration, an article in the Washington Post said on Saturday. It outlines how the US can prepare for a potential war with China and defend itself from threats in the “near abroad,” including Greenland and the Panama
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is maintaining close ties with Beijing, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said yesterday, hours after a new round of Chinese military drills in the Taiwan Strait began. Political parties in a democracy have a responsibility to be loyal to the nation and defend its sovereignty, DPP spokesman Justin Wu (吳崢) told a news conference in Taipei. His comments came hours after Beijing announced via Chinese state media that the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command was holding large-scale drills simulating a multi-pronged attack on Taiwan. Contrary to the KMT’s claims that it is staunchly anti-communist, KMT Deputy
RESPONSE: The government would investigate incidents of Taiwanese entertainers in China promoting CCP propaganda online in contravention of the law, the source said Taiwanese entertainers living in China who are found to have contravened cross-strait regulations or collaborated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) could be subject to fines, a source said on Sunday. Several Taiwanese entertainers have posted on the social media platform Sina Weibo saying that Taiwan “must be returned” to China, and sharing news articles from Chinese state media. In response, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) has asked the Ministry of Culture to investigate whether the entertainers had contravened any laws, and asked for them to be questioned upon their return to Taiwan, an official familiar with the matter said. To curb repeated
Myanmar has turned down an offer of assistance from Taiwanese search-and-rescue teams after a magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck the nation on Friday last week, saying other international aid is sufficient, the National Fire Agency said yesterday. More than 1,700 have been killed and 3,400 injured in the quake that struck near the central Myanmar city of Mandalay early on Friday afternoon, followed minutes later by a magnitude 6.7 aftershock. Worldwide, 13 international search-and-rescue teams have been deployed, with another 13 teams mobilizing, the agency said. Taiwan’s search-and-rescue teams were on standby, but have since been told to stand down, as