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US reaffirms TRA at
Wang Yi’s meeting in Washington
BETTER COMMUNICATIONS: The US complained it had
not been told beforehand about a lot of cross-strait policies, including the
'one country, two areas' formula
By J. Michael Cole / Staff reporter
US Deputy Secretary of State William Burns on Thursday reaffirmed Washington’s
adherence to the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA) during a meeting with Taiwan Affairs
Office Minister Wang Yi (王毅).
Wang, who is in the US on a regular visit, also met senior White House
officials, Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Kurt
Campbell, members of Congress and academics, including former US national
security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, Richard Bush and Kenneth Lieberthal from
the Brookings Institution, and Alan Romberg of the Stimson Center.
During his meeting with Burns, Wang said he hoped the US would continue to play
an active role in the process of relations across the Taiwan Strait, adding that
“positive developments” in the strait could help Sino-US relations develop along
the lines of mutual trust rather than friction.
China’s state-owned Xinhua news agency made no mention of Burns’ reaffirming
Washington’s adherence to the TRA in its coverage of his talks with Wang.
Taiwan remains the most sensitive and important issue between the US and China,
Wang said, reaffirming Beijing’s opposition to US arms sales to Taiwan.
Turning to President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) inaugural address on May 20, Wang said
he hoped Ma would emphasize the need to ensure the current momentum on relations
between Taipei and Beijing.
Although China looks forward to entering political dialogue with Taiwan, Wang
said cross-strait negotiations would for the time being continue to focus on
economics.
The Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) itself requires a lot of
negotiation, while talks on financial, industrial and investment cooperation
have entered “a relatively difficult stage,” he said.
Wang and US officials did not discuss the recent proposal by former Chinese
Nationalist Party (KMT) chairman Wu Poh-hsiung (吳伯雄) of a “one country, two
areas (一國兩區)” framework. However, asked to comment on the subject during a
meeting with academics on Wednesday, he said the formula was an important step
toward achieving “positive progress” in cross-strait relations and set the tone
for party-to-party exchanges.
As the “one country, two areas” proposal remains controversial among Taiwanese,
some US academics opined that China was also being placed in an awkward
position.
While Beijing likes the Ma government’s take on the “one country” concept, it,
however, does not wish to publicly embrace Ma’s point that the “one country”
refers to the Republic of China, US academics said.
Meanwhile, sources confirmed the US was not informed beforehand of Wu’s “one
country, two areas” proposal.
From how things have proceeded from Ma’s proposal of cross-strait peace accords
late last year to the recently touted “one country, two areas” concept, there
appears to be a need for Taiwan to enhance its communications with the US,
sources said.
Additional reporting by Nadia Tsao
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