Pro-Taiwan groups protest against cross-strait talks

By Jason Pan  /  Staff reporter

Sun, Feb 08, 2015 - Page 3

Members of groups supporting Taiwanese independence were joined by civic activists at a demonstration in Taipei yesterday to protest against the planned high-level cross-strait talks between Taiwan and China on various trade and political issues.

The protesters gathered in front of the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) office before marching to the Presidential Office Building and ending their action late in the afternoon.

Organizers said they were demonstrating against cross-strait talks between MAC Minister Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦) and Chinese Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) Minister Zhang Zhijun (張志軍), as the event was to begin yesterday, but was canceled in an announcement on Thursday.

The activists handed a letter to the council demanding that before the resumption of cross-strait talks, China must remove all the missiles it has aimed at Taiwan, and that the Chinese government renounce the threat of military attack against Taiwan.

Headed by the Taiwanese National Party (TNP, 台灣民族黨), the protesters also included members from the 908 Taiwan Republic Campaign, Taiwanese National Congress and the Taiwan Independence Association.

“We are here to stop the government from signing any secret deal with China. We want to stand up to oppose President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) selling out Taiwan to China,” TNP Chairman Tsua Gim-liong (蔡金龍) said. “Although the meeting was canceled this time, the MAC and TAO have already set the meeting agenda. The whole thing is illegal because there was no transparency, no monitoring mechanism and no consultation with Taiwanese people.”

It was to be the third set of high-level cross-strait talks between Wang and Zhang, and was to take place on Kinmen Island (金門).

Another activist, surnamed Lin (林), said that when Zhang came to Taiwan for the MAC-TAO talks and to meet with Wang in June last year, many Taiwanese citizens, students and civic groups held protests at all the locations he visited.

“Police roughed up and injured some of the students and civilian protesters. Others were arrested for participating in the demonstration. Still we come here today to tell Zhang that he is not welcome, and that Taiwanese people must stand up to China’s threat,” he said.

The MAC said that the meeting was canceled due to both sides needing to deal with events concerning Wednesday’s crash of TransAsia Airways Flight GE235.

Another reason for the cancellation, according to the MAC, was that both sides still had disagreements over China’s newly drawn flight routes that run close to the median line of the Taiwan Strait.