A Taiwanese pro-independence legislator's claim that the island's president, Ma Ying-jeou, was born in Shenzhen, and not Hong Kong, drew a swift response from Mr Ma yesterday.
Mr Ma's office responded to the allegation within hours, with presidential office spokesman Wang Yu-chi holding a rare press conference to publicly display the president's birth certificate issued by Hong Kong Immigration's birth and death registry.
The certificate stated that the Taiwanese president was born at Kwong Wah Hospital in Kowloon, Taiwan's semi-official Central News Agency said.
It was the first time Mr Ma had shown his Hong Kong birth certificate to the public.
Chai Trong-trong, a legislator from the opposition Democratic Progressive Party, had said earlier Mr Ma had not been born in Hong Kong - as he so often claimed, but in Shenzhen.
To some die-hard pro-independent Taiwanese, being born on the mainland is an irredeemable flaw and the very fact would bring the person's true allegiance into question.