Beijing and new Taiwan leader Tsai Ing-wen get off to positive start in relations
Mainland softens stance over crucial 1992 consensus on one China, while Ing puts stop to proposal to remove portraits of Sun Yat-sen in public buildings
Relations between Beijing and the incoming Tsai Ing-wen government in Taipei appear to have got off to a good start with both sides flashing signals of goodwill – providing nothing drastic happens to damage cross-strait stability in future, analysts said.
Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in Washington on Friday that he hoped whoever is in power in Taiwan indicates their willingness to pursue peaceful development of cross-strait ties and that they accept the provision in Taiwan’s constitution that the mainland and Taiwan belongs to one China.
The comment – the first by a senior mainland official since Tsai, the leader of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party, won the island’s presidential election in January – was seen by analysts as an olive branch from Beijing in response to Tsai’s reluctance to accept the “1992 consensus”.
“By using the word ‘constitution,’ it shows to some extent Beijing’s goodwill,” said Tung Chen-yuan, a professor at the Graduate Institute of Development Studies at National Chengchi University in Taipei.
“It also indicates that Beijing is adjusting its attitude, no longer insisting on the term ‘1992 consensus,’ and is willing to establish new basis for cross-strait political interaction with the new DPP government,” he said.
The consensus refers to a tacit understanding reached between Taipei and Beijing in 1992, stating that the two sides should temporarily shelve thorny political issues to carry on talks as long as they abide by the one-China principle. It also allows either side to have its own interpretation of what that China stands for.