The chairman of Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council yesterday described Hong Kong Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa as a positive asset for Taiwan-Hong Kong relations.
Chang King-yuh was one of several top officials to give more than 200 foreign journalists his Government's position on the state of affairs following the handover.
His comment was the only optimistic one presented by the officials, who saw no end to the freeze in relations across the Taiwan Strait, despite Hong Kong's handover and remarks by President Jiang Zemin in Beijing on Tuesday over solving the Taiwan question.
Mr Chang described yesterday's meeting in Hong Kong between Mr Tung and the chairman of Taiwan's Straits Exchange Foundation, Koo Chen-fu, as a positive development and one that was very important.
'Taiwan has been a sovereign state since 1912 . . . has its own defence forces and diplomatic policy,' Mr Chang said.
He added that 'the Government and people of Taiwan want to say 'no' to Beijing's communism and one-party rule'.
