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CHEN: SCRAPPING OF UNIFICATION GUIDELINES CONSIDERED

ROC Central News Agency

2006-01-31 16:15:06

    Taipei, Jan. 31 (CNA) President Chen Shui-bian sent shockwaves through Taipei political circles by declaring on Sunday that he is seriously considering abolishing policy guidelines for the eventually unification of Taiwan and China.

    Speaking at a lunch party with political leaders at

Matou, Tainan County, Chen said it was time for Taiwan to "move on its own road" by getting rid of the Guidelines on National Unification enacted in 1991 when the country was ruled by the Kuomintang.

    The president, who pledged in his 2000 inaugural speech not to do this, said the guidelines and the National Unification Council tasked with setting the policy to promote national unification "existed only in name."

    Likening the council to a store with a sign but no stock, Chen said it was out of the question that the council could accomplish the goal of national unification.

    Noting the disappointment of many overseas Taiwanese with the current situation, Chen said his administration was seriously considering leading the country onto a new road to enhance the Taiwan's international profile.

    Chen pledged to craft a new constitution for the country, and push the country's bid to join the United Nations under the name of Taiwan rather than the Republic of China.

    The president said most Taiwanese support Taiwan's pursuit of its own national identity. He pledged to stick to the principle of democracy and to further develop the country and gain full sovereignty status.

    In an attempt to play down the political implications of Chen's statement, an aide said later that day in Taipei that the president was simply following a Legislative Yuan resolution by weighing the possibility of scrapping the National Unification Council.

    Claiming the establishment of the National Unification Council was not based on a legal framework that could be approved or governed by the Legislative Yuan, but instead set up by a presidential order that has not been approved by the Legislature, Chen Wen-tsung, director of the Presidential Office's Public Affairs Department, said the Legislature has asked the president to stop the operation of agencies which are not based on law.

    Chen Wen-tsung dismissed opposition charges that the president was contradicting his 2000 inaugural promises by repealing the Guidelines for National Unification, saying that no final decision had been made so far.

    His opinion was echoed by an anonymous official at the Mainland Affairs Council, the government agency in charge of making Taiwan's policy toward China.

    The official said Chen was simply prodding the public to think seriously about the necessity of keeping the Guidelines for National Unification and the National Unification Council.

    Chen, who is the chairman of the National Unification Council, never called a council meeting after he took office in 2000 despite his promise to keep it intact.

(By Maubo Chang)

ENDITEM/diG