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KMT head undecided over what to discuss with CPC chief in Beijing

ROC Central News Agency

2016/10/19 20:34:22

Taipei, Oct. 19 (CNA) The chairwoman of Taiwan's main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) said Wednesday that she will allow herself "room for flexibility" when talking with Communist Party of China (CPC) General Secretary Xi Jinping (習近平) in Beijing early next month.

KMT Chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) is likely to meet with China's top leader Nov. 1 ahead of an annual conference between the two parties that is now titled the "Cross-Strait Peaceful Development Forum," scheduled for Nov. 2-3.

During a meeting of the KMT's Central Standing Committee in Taipei, Hung said she told the party's legislative caucus a day earlier that she had not decided on what to discuss with Xi.

"It depends. I will do what I can, and should, to achieve our goals in Beijing," she said.

As relations across the Taiwan Strait have cooled to "freezing point," with all official channels of communication suspended, "isn't it our duty, as a responsible political party, to figure out ways of doing something for the people of Taiwan?" Hung asked.

"The media and our lawmakers have given me quite a number of suggestions as to what to talk about [with Xi], and I'm keeping them all in mind," she said.

On the more urgent issue of how to pay the salaries of KMT workers now that some of the party's assets have been frozen, Hung said she will seek the views of four previous party chairmen Thursday in a bid to solve the problem.

She noted that she herself has been working very hard since the Democratic Progressive Party government established a special committee, which very quickly froze some of the KMT's bank accounts on suspicion that they might be "illicit assets" that should be confiscated.

Some 800 of the KMT's grassroots party workers have not seen their paychecks for last month and are not expected to get their pay for this month if the DPP-dominated committee remains unbending.

Hung denied that her party has sought China's assistance to raise funds for the workers, angrily dismissing any such speculation as "ridiculous, total nonsense, divisive, groundless and extremely immoral."

She said she has asked the party's Vice Chairman Chan Chi-hsien (詹啟賢) to rally the party members, persuade the DPP government not to illegally freeze KMT assets, and negotiate a way for the party to get out of the woods.

(By Hsieh Chia-chen and S.C. Chang)
ENDITEM/J