President Tsai Looks To Maintain Ties With China
MEP: Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen said on Tuesday Taiwan’s government will continue to look for ways to maintain discussion with China after Beijing announced Saturday that it had stopped contacts with the Taipei.
Tsai, who heads the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party, says she wants to maintain the status quo and is committed to ensuring peace, Reuters reported Wednesday.
“We will continue the dialogue with mainland China, as even though, probably at this moment official negotiation channels have been temporarily interrupted, there still exist other options for communication and dialogue,” she said, speaking through an interpreter.
China, which regards the self-ruled island as a wayward province, is deeply suspicious of Tsai, who took office last month, since Beijing suspects she will push for formal independence.
Since 2008, Taipei and Beijing have witnessed a thaw in diplomatic relations after Taiwan’s China-friendly then-President Ma Ying-jeou signed a series of historic trade and tourism deals with the mainland.
China has insisted she recognize a pact called the “1992 consensus” between its Communists and Taiwan’s then-ruling Nationalists, by which both agreed there is only one China, with each having its own interpretation of what that means.
“No matter what party is in government in Taiwan, we always have a single, common objective: to maintain peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait,” Tsai told reporters during a visit to Paraguay, Taiwan’s sole diplomatically in South America.
Taiwan Premier Lin Chuan said the government’s approach was for positive interactions with China to continue, based on existing foundations.
“There must be willingness on both sides to move forward on the relationship,” Lin told reporters about the suspension issue at a function in southern Taiwan.
