However, the ferry is now a popular option for Taiwan residents to travel to the mainland because only a small selection of cross-strait flights have resumed to date. According to Taipei’s Ministry of the Interior, fewer than 730,000 Taiwanese – just 37 per cent of the number in 2019 – travelled by boat from Quemoy … Read more
Founded in 1999 by Chiang Pin-kung, then chairman of the island’s Council for Economic Planning and Development, the club got its name from the monthly lunch meeting he hosted with top business leaders. It is the first large business group from Taiwan to visit mainland China after William Lai Ching-te of the Democratic Progressive Party … Read more
In an interview with Time magazine published on Tuesday, Biden said “it would depend on the circumstances” whether the US would use force to defend Taiwan from an attack by the People’s Liberation Army. He would “not rule out using US military force” but made a distinction between deploying ground forces versus using air and … Read more
Beijing views the self-governed island as its territory that must be brought under its control, by force if necessary. Most countries, including the United States, do not recognise Taiwan as independent, but are opposed to unilateral change of the cross-strait status quo by force. Cross-strait relations, already strained over the past eight years, deteriorated further … Read more
A noted policy adviser has called on Beijing to adopt the integration policies of former West Germany and “unilaterally open” up the borders to all Taiwanese for speedier unification. Zheng Yongnian, a professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s Shenzhen campus, made the call on Wednesday at a seminar focusing on academic and people-to-people … Read more
Hours earlier, Beijing announced the launch of a two-day military exercise around Taiwan as practice run for a blockade, after accusing Lai at length of sending “dangerous signals” on the island’s independence in his inaugural address. Lei, who worked with then fellow lawmaker Lai from 2005 to 2008 – when his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) … Read more
According to the commentary, Lai was “vigorously promoting separatist fallacies, inciting confrontation and hostility across the Taiwan Strait”. The speech was “full of provocative rhetoric, peddling the ‘two-country theory’ and advocating for ‘mutual non-subordination’ between the two sides”, it said. Several senior Beijing officials had earlier slammed Lai for sending “dangerous signals” in the speech, … Read more
Lai’s inauguration marks an unprecedented third term for the DPP. However, unlike Tsai when she became president in 2016, Lai made no mention of the 1992 consensus in his address. The consensus is a tacit agreement between Beijing and Taipei that there is one China but each side of the Taiwan Strait can have its … Read more
He also urged the island’s residents not to harbour any illusions about Beijing. “So long as China refuses to renounce the use of force against Taiwan, all of us in Taiwan ought to understand that even if we accept the entirety of China’s position and give up our sovereignty, China’s ambition to annex Taiwan will … Read more
Lai’s speech “stubbornly adheres to the stance of ‘Taiwan independence’, vigorously promotes the fallacy of separatism, incites cross-strait confrontation, and attempts to ‘rely on external forces to seek independence’” , according to the statement. Beijing’s leadership took a similar five hours before issuing a statement in 2016 after Lai’s predecessor Tsai Ing-wen made her first … Read more
