Senior Taiwan officials, confident that cross-strait talks can restart, say Taipei is ready to resume exchanges between negotiators.
Addressing the Legislative Yuan yesterday, premier Vincent Siew Wan-chang said he was glad tension with the mainland was subsiding, and hoped that talks, broken off in mid-1995, could resume. 'We are in favour of anything that would benefit national reunification, including an exchange of visits between high officials of both sides.
'Mr Jiang Zemin said Chinese should not fight other Chinese, and our President Lee Teng-hui responded even more actively by saying Chinese should help other Chinese.' On Wednesday, the Beijing-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, which acts as an intermediary body with Taipei in the absence of formal contacts, notified its Taiwan counterpart, the Straits Exchange Foundation, it would also welcome the resumption of exchanges between senior officials.
Officials with Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council said yesterday they were pleased with the development and that the foundation would contact the association with a specific proposal next week.
Unconfirmed reports said Taipei would probably begin by offering to send the foundation's new secretary-general, Shi Hwei-yow, on a visit to the mainland.
Taipei was also said to be hoping for a meeting between foundation chairman Koo Chen-fu and his association counterpart Wang Daohan.
It was hoped Mr Shi could visit before April 29, the fifth anniversary of the landmark Singapore meeting between Mr Koo and Mr Wang, reports said.