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Chen accuses Ma of
breaking cross-strait promises
By Vincent Y. Chao / Staff Reporter
President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) broke his promises on cross-strait relations and
failed to fully disclose the makeup of his campaign funding, former president
Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) said in his latest statement from jail.
Chen, who is serving a 17-and-a-half-year sentence, said through his office
yesterday that in a meeting on April 1, 2008, Ma had informed him he would not
pursue deals with Beijing without its admission of a “one China with different
interpretations” concept.
While Beijing has not recognized the concept of different interpretations — that
Taiwan and China each have their own definition of “one China” — Ma has since
approved 15 cross-strait agreements, ranging from economic deals to food safety,
Chen said.
“In the past three years, China hasn’t backed down on its view of ‘one China
with different interpretations.’ Beijing has never accepted that ‘one China’ can
have separate interpretations,” Chen said.
“Ma’s lies over these three years have made the April 1 [meeting] an April
fool’s joke,” he said.
Officials from his office said Chen’s statement was penned in Taipei Prison
yesterday.
Unlike the cordial atmosphere of their 90-minute meeting two months prior to
Ma’s entering office, Chen heaped criticism on Ma in the latest of his
long--running series of journal entries.
Now in its 18th edition, the bi-weekly entries are released online by the former
president’s office.
In his latest entry, Chen also took aim at Ma’s 2008 campaign finances, saying
he had only declared NT$670 million (US$23.46 million) in income and NT$640
million in expenditures, which was “far below” the number he claimed was
necessary to fund a presidential campaign.
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