New Taipei City Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜), the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) presidential candidate, yesterday proposed transforming Kinmen County into a cross-strait economic pilot zone and transportation hub to help facilitate peaceful exchanges between Taiwan and China.
During a trip to Kinmen, which is less than 10km from southeast China, Hou said that turning the area into an economic pilot zone that offers tax incentives would help attract Chinese investment in to the county.
He said that if elected in January next year he would enhance the major ports in Kinmen and increase the frequency of flights in and out of the county to make the zone possible.
Photo: CNA
He also proposed that Kinmen become a medical and healthcare hub, not only to solve the longstanding problem of a lack of medical resources in the county, but also to make it a destination for Chinese medical tourists.
The KMT candidate said that Kinmen should import electricity and natural gas from China’s Fujian Province to ensure supply, after it began importing water from Jinjiang, China, in 2018.
Regarding a proposal by some Kinmen residents to construct a bridge linking the county with Xiamen, China, Hou said that he is open to all opinions and respects the wishes of Kinmen residents who plan to hold a referendum on the issue.
He said that his support of a referendum and of importing electricity and natural gas from China are based on the condition that doing so would not negatively affect Taiwan’s national security.
The proposal for a Kinmen-Xiamen bridge has previously been criticized by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) as posing a national security risk should China invade.
Hou arrived in Kinmen yesterday afternoon, a day before the 65th anniversary of the 823 Artillery Bombardment of the county, a key battle that marked the beginning of the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis.
On Aug. 23, 1958, nine years after the Republic of China (ROC) government retreated from China to Taiwan after losing the Chinese Civil War, Chinese communist forces attacked Kinmen. Over the next 44 days, 475,000 artillery shells were fired at the islands in an attempt to take them over.
In his news conference, Hou thanked Kinmen residents for standing on the front line of defending the ROC from invasion 65 years ago.
The country’s prosperity and democracy would forever be indebted to them for their contributions, he said.
Hou reiterated his support for a version of the so-called “1992 consensus” that conforms with the Constitution, without elaborating.
He said that he would try to reopen dialogue with China on equal footing to prevent a cross-strait war, because “there can be no losers in peace and no victors in war.”
The “1992 consensus” — a term that former Mainland Affairs Council chairman Su Chi (蘇起) in 2006 admitted making up in 2000 — refers to a tacit understanding between the KMT and the Chinese Communist Party that both sides of the Taiwan Strait acknowledge that there is “one China,” with each side having its own interpretation of what “China” means.
Beijing shut down its official communication channel with Taiwan after the DPP, which has refused to accept the “1992 consensus,” came to power in May 2016.
The DPP says it does accept the “1992 consensus” on the grounds that Beijing has never acknowledged the ROC’s existence and that agreeing to the consensus implies acceptance of China’s claim over Taiwan.
CAUTION: Based on intelligence from the nation’s security agencies, MOFA has cautioned Taiwanese travelers about heightened safety risks in China-friendly countries The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday urged Taiwanese to be aware of their safety when traveling abroad, especially in countries that are friendly to China. China in June last year issued 22 guidelines that allow its courts to try in absentia and sentence to death so-called “diehard” Taiwanese independence activists, even though Chinese courts have no jurisdiction in Taiwan. Late last month, a senior Chinese official gave closed-door instructions to state security units to implement the guidelines in countries friendly to China, a government memo and a senior Taiwan security official said, based on information gathered by Taiwan’s intelligence agency. The
The National Immigration Agency (NIA) said yesterday that it will revoke the dependent-based residence permit of a Chinese social media influencer who reportedly “openly advocated for [China’s] unification through military force” with Taiwan. The Chinese national, identified by her surname Liu (劉), will have her residence permit revoked in accordance with Article 14 of the “Measures for the permission of family- based residence, long-term residence and settlement of people from the Mainland Area in the Taiwan Area,” the NIA said in a news release. The agency explained it received reports that Liu made “unifying Taiwan through military force” statements on her online
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, said yesterday that it is looking to hire 8,000 people this year, at a time when the tech giant is expanding production capacity to maintain its lead over competitors. To attract talent, TSMC would launch a large-scale recruitment campaign on campuses across Taiwan, where a newly recruited engineer with a master’s degree could expect to receive an average salary of NT$2.2 million (US$60,912), which is much higher than the 2023 national average of NT$709,000 for those in the same category, according to government statistics. TSMC, which accounted for more than 60 percent
Tung Tzu-hsien (童子賢), a Taiwanese businessman and deputy convener of the nation’s National Climate Change Committee, said yesterday that “electrical power is national power” and nuclear energy is “very important to Taiwan.” Tung made the remarks, suggesting that his views do not align with the country’s current official policy of phasing out nuclear energy, at a forum organized by the Taiwan People’s Party titled “Challenges and Prospects of Taiwan’s AI Industry and Energy Policy.” “Taiwan is currently pursuing industries with high added- value and is developing vigorously, and this all requires electricity,” said the chairman
RSS