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DPP denies opening talks with China
MISQUOTED?: While Reuters quoted the DPP chief as saying
the party had organized a group to open talks with China, the DPP said Tsai
Ing-wen had not addressed that issue
By Vincent Y. Chao
STAFF REPORTER
Wednesday, May 12, 2010, Page 1
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday denied it is already in the
process of opening talks with China.
The party made the rebuttal following a Reuters interview with DPP Chairperson
Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), which quoted Tsai as saying: “The [DPP] has already
organized a group of scholars and non-governmental organizations to open talks
[with China].”
In a press briefing, DPP spokesperson Lin Yu-chang (林右昌) yesterday said Tsai did
not address the issue during the interview, which took place in English. <> He
also denied that the DPP had any plans to organize a group for such a purpose.
The party later released a statement to add: “What Chairperson Tsai said during
the interview was that there are many non-governmental organizations and think
tanks that the DPP has long relationships with … If China engages in dialogue
with these groups, it will help them understand more about the DPP.”
“However, Taiwan is a democratic society, and these groups are independent and
are not part of the DPP,” the statement said.
The DPP’s China policies have come under increasing attention after a series of
public comments made by Tsai hinted at a subtle shift in how the party would
conduct future cross-strait dialogue.
Tsai said in the interview that the DPP would “pursue a separate dialogue
mechanism with Beijing, possibly under the umbrella of an outside organization,
to seek peace and ‘teach Beijing about the island’s democracy.’”
The remarks were consistent with comments Tsai made to a gathering of
international media outlets last week.
She said the DPP would not be opposed to engaging in direct dialogue with
Beijing if there were no political preconditions.
She also said future relations with China would be more “more stable and
consistent,” comments that have been widely interpreted by political analysts as
a move away from former president Chen Shui-bian’s (陳水扁) China policies.
Speaking to the Taipei Times, cross-strait affairs expert and former Mainland
Affairs Council vice-chairman Alexander Huang (黃介正) said that Tsai’s
announcement was made to pacify critics of the DPP’s China policies and show
that it could “responsibly handle cross-strait relations.”
The latest opinion poll released by the party found Tsai’s China policies have
drawn wide acceptance among DPP supporters, with 86 percent of those polled
saying that they supported her stance.
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