Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday urged Taiwanese to carefully consider their personal safety when planning to travel to China, after the legislature on Tuesday passed a resolution asking the government to lift its ban on group tours.
The government in February canceled its original plan of reopening group tours to China, which had been suspended during the COVID-19 pandemic, after Beijing failed to reciprocate and showed hostility by making unilateral changes to flight routes near Taiwan.
Prepaid group tours to China between March 1 and May 31 were allowed, but all group tours were banned from June 1.
Photo: Liao Chen-hui, Taipei Times
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) legislative caucuses proposed lifting the ban and on Tuesday passed a non-binding resolution which calls on the government to prioritize allowing Chinese tourists to visit Kinmen, Matsu and Penghu via the “small three links.”
China last month unilaterally announced new guidelines to punish “die-hard” “Taiwanese independence” separatists, but it does not have jurisdiction over Taiwanese, Cho said.
“We hope, especially at this time, employers would think carefully before sending Taiwanese employees to work in China, and not just for work, we also hope Taiwanese would consider [their safety] carefully when planning to travel or do anything in China,” he said.
Regarding the legislative resolution, Cho said: “If our people travel to China and encounter something unexpected, the responsibility [of dealing with it] still falls on the Executive Yuan, not the Legislative Yuan.”
“We strongly urge people to be very cautious if they visit China, no matter for work, for tourism or any other purpose,” he said, adding that he hopes lawmakers can understand that they carry heavy responsibility for ensuring the personal safety of Taiwanese.
Separately, the Mainland Affairs Council on Tuesday evening issued a statement saying that it respects the legislative resolution, but also urges China to reciprocate by pushing for healthy tourism exchanges.
It said the government in August last year announced the plan to reopen group tours to China and it has never banned independent travel to China, with more than 120,000 visits having been made between March and last month.
However, China imposed a ban on independent travel to Taiwan on Aug. 1, 2019, the statement said.
While China conditionally reopened group tours to Taiwan by residents of Fujian Province since April 28, so far no one has come, it said.
Meanwhile, Cho yesterday also commented on another legislative resolution requesting that President William Lai (賴清德) present a state of the nation address at the legislature.
Cho said the Constitutional Court has not yet ruled on controversial amendments to the Act Governing the Legislative Yuan’s Power (立法院職權行使法), so the current situation is highly uncertain and it is inappropriate to discuss the matter at this time.
Regarding new nuclear power technologies, Cho said that a breakthrough could be possible by 2030, so if a new technology could solve the problems of nuclear safety and nuclear waste, Taiwan could reopen discussions on using nuclear power.
Asked to comment on the Ministry of Finance finding more than 1,500 suspected cases of dummy buyers and abuses of the preferential housing loans for first-time buyers, he said the Cabinet has implemented measures that require developers to strictly review the qualification of buyers.
The Cabinet does not rule out the possibility of further action if developers fail to conform to the rules, he said.
“Do not underestimate the government’s ability to uncover violations,” he said.
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