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Taiwan people remain wary of engaging China: VP

ROC Central News Agency

Taipei, Dec.3 (CNA) Vice President Vincent Siew said Wednesday Taiwan people remain wary of engaging China mainly because Taiwan's eased policy toward China has not yet yielded obvious interests and Beijing has not responded favorably to Taiwan's appeals for an end to military threat and diplomatic isolation.

Siew made the remarks in a speech delivered at a lunch meeting in Taipei organized by the Brookings Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies (CNAPS), a noted U.S. think tank.

Although tensions in relations across the Taiwan Strait have thawed since the inauguration of President Ma Ying-jeou's administration in May, Siew said a spate of large-scale street protests seen during top Chinese negotiator Chen Yunlin's historic visit to Taiwan early last month indicate that more efforts must be done to alleviate local people's wariness toward cross-strait engagements.

Siew attributed Taiwan people's wariness to two major reasons -- the launch of direct cross-strait charter flights and Taiwan's opening up to Chinese tourists has yet to bring about substantial interests and local people find that Beijing has not shown explicit goodwill response to calls for dismantling more than 1,000 ballistic missiles targeting Taiwan and for stopping its boycott of Taiwan's presence in world arenas.

At the moment, Siew said, China still deploys 1,400 missiles against Taiwan and has not shown any intention to compromise on Taiwan's participation in the annual World Health Assembly (WHA) meetings and East Asian economic integration.

"Only when these critical issues are resolved can people of Taiwan reach a higher degree of consensus on the development of cross-strait relations, " Siew said.

Meanwhile, Siew said Taiwan needs the support of major countries around the world, including the United States, in its pursuit of representation in the WHA and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

In light of Taiwan's contribution to the world economy, Siew said he sees no reasons for ASEAN to exclude Taiwan from regional economic integration.

On relations with the United States, Siew said he looks forward to seeing progress in major bilateral cooperation projects, including negotiations for signing a Taiwan-U.S. free trade agreement (FTA) , following the inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama next month. (By Sofia Wu) enditem