Presidential Office reiterates transparency in dialogue with China
ROC Central News Agency
2010/05/16 20:02:26
Taipei, May 16 (CNA) Any cross-Taiwan Strait decisions that are legally binding or involve the exercise of public authority should be concluded through talks between quasi-official intermediary bodies and under legislative supervision, an official said Sunday.
The United Daily News on Sunday quoted former National Security Council Secretary-General Su Chi as saying that Taiwan and China have forged about 20 communications channels, some of them secret that cannot be made public.
The comment was seen by some as calling into question the government's pledges of transparency in dealing with China, and Presidential Office spokesman Lo Chih-chiang acknowledged that cross-strait exchanges and dialogue have been conducted through both formal direct channels and informal civilian channels.
But Lo stressed that any cross-strait affairs involving the execution of public authority or that were legally binding had to be handled by the two officially authorized intermediary bodies -- Taipei's Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) and the Beijing-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) -- under the supervision of the Legislative Yuan.
The government has consistently dealt with such matters in an open and transparent manner, Lo said.
According to the Chinese-language newspaper report, Su said that in addition to the regular contact mechanism for government agencies, there were also secret communication channels with China.
Su, however, would not go into detail about the operational modes of such channels, saying only that the National Security Council (NSC) had not been involved in any direct dialogue with China.
No NSC officials would comment on Su's remarks, and Su has not yet responded to local reporters' inquiries about the report. (By Garfie Li and Sofia Wu) enditem/ls
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