|
||||||||
|
APPROACH︰Participants in the first of
nine special meetings appeared to be split on the party’s
general strategy on cross-strait relations, a member said By
Chris Wang / Staff reporter Fri,
Jul 05, 2013 - Page 3 The
Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) first of nine special meetings ended
yesterday, during which the party reaffirmed its resolution on Taiwan’s
future of 1999 and opposition to the “one China” framework as the core values
of the DPP’s China policy. Party
members agreed that the party has to be flexible in its dealings with Beijing
to vie for domestic as well as international support. “The
participants agreed that the biggest difference between the DPP and the
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is our insistence on safeguarding Taiwan’s
sovereignty and protecting the Taiwanese public’s right to determine its own
future,” said Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦), spokesperson of the DPP’s China Affairs Committee. About
70 DPP politicians and academics attended the two-hour closed-door meeting,
the first of nine on the DPP’s China policy, and engaged in enthusiastic
discussions, Cheng said. Summing
up the discussions, Cheng said participants agreed that domestic support
would be the most valuable asset for the party; the party should be confident
in dealing with Beijing because more than 70 percent of the public identified
themselves as Taiwanese, despite the acceleration of cross-strait engagement
in recent years; and some people did benefit from bilateral economic exchanges. Former
deputy foreign minister Michael Kau (高英茂) was quoted as saying that
the DPP should be patient and flexible in formulating its China policy, since
the endgame solution of the cross-strait political dilemma may not arise in
this or the next generation. Therefore,
the short to medium-term goal for the DPP should be pursuing peace and
lowering tensions across the Strait, Cheng quoted Kau
as saying. Central
Executive Committee member Hung Chi-kune (洪智坤) said after the meeting that
participants appeared to be split on the party’s
general strategy on cross-strait relations, with some favoring an ambiguous
approach while others, most of whom are independence supporters, insisting
that the strategy should be clear. However,
most attention was directed toward two participants —
former premier Frank Hsieh (謝長廷), who had returned from a cross-strait forum in
Hong Kong on Wednesday, and former DPP lawmaker Shen
Fu-hsiung (沈富雄), whose political view has been leaning toward
the pan-blue camp since quitting the DPP. Cheng and National Dong Hwa University
professor Shih Cheng-feng (施正鋒)
said that participants who held different views from Hsieh’s
refrained from directly criticizing the former premier, who left the meeting
early. However, Shih did pose a question about Hsieh’s remarks in Hong Kong
about Taiwan and China as a “community of destiny” and said the remarks were
“inappropriate” because China still holds hostility and territorial ambition
against Taiwan, they added. The
DPP’s China policy should be acceptable to all Taiwanese, tolerated by
Beijing and differ from the KMT’s China policy, Shen
said, adding that the KMT’s recent recognition of the “one China” framework
proved that its initiatives of the so-called “1992 consensus” and “one China
with different interpretations” never existed. The
second meeting, which is to focus on how the DPP should handle the “1992
consensus,” is scheduled to take place on July 25. * 《Taipei Times》2013/07/05。 |
