KMT Calls Cross-Strait Tensions 'Perilous' on 10th Anniversary of Ma-Xi Meeting

TaiwanPlus News

On the 10th anniversary of a historic meeting between then-Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou and Chinese President Xi Jinping, Taiwan's main opposition party, the Kuomintang, says the cross-strait situation is now perilous under Taiwan's current government and advocates for warmer ties with Beijing to maintain peace.

Transcript

00:01A historic meeting in 2015 between Chinese President Xi Jinping and then-Taiwan President Ma Injio,

00:08the first time the leaders of Taiwan and China had met in over six decades,

00:13both sides painting it as an opportunity to improve relations.

00:18Ten years later, Ma still hails the meeting as a crucial moment for cross-strait goodwill.

00:24In a Facebook post commemorating the meeting's anniversary,

00:26writing that it built a, quote, bridge of peace and represented the highest achievement of the

00:32institutionalization of cross-strait exchanges. And Ma's then-party, the Kuomintang, now Taiwan's

00:38main opposition party, which has warmer ties with China, is using the anniversary to criticize

00:43Taiwan's current Democratic Progressive Party government for heightened cross-strait tensions

00:48and to advocate closer relations with Beijing to maintain peace.

00:56But one expert says the historic meeting, held just months before Ma's second term ended and coming

01:18on the heels of a massive student movement against a controversial cross-strait agreement,

01:23was largely only symbolic. He believes it had little concrete impact on cross-strait relations as a

01:29whole.

01:30Well, Ma Injio had very little time left in his second term, and he had been stymied in the

01:37legislature to try and get these services packed through by the Sunflower Movement. So essentially,

01:43all of his efforts to try and boost ties across the strait had ground to a halt. So it was,

01:51at that point, it was only small symbolic things. So ultimately, it really didn't have much of a

01:56practical effect, because politically, there was not much that Ma Injio could authorize at the time

02:06over the objections of the legislature and, at that point, public opinion. Obviously, on the Chinese

02:13side, there wasn't much that they could do either because of the constraints of the relationship,

02:21but also the constraints that Ma Injio was under.

02:24Soon after the meeting, in 2016, Beijing cut off all communication with Taipei after Taiwan elected

02:30Tsai Ing-wen its new leader. Tsai and her party, the Democratic Progressive Party, refused to accept that

02:36both sides belong to the same country. The DPP stays on as the ruling party in Taiwan to this day,

02:43and China's efforts to step up its pressure tactics against the country continue, driving up

02:48cross-strait tensions. Taiwan Plus reached out to the presidential office and the Mainland Affairs

02:53Council, which governs relations with China, but both declined to comment on the meeting's anniversary.

02:58With Beijing's pressure showing no signs of easing, the expert says the KMT may look to use its peace

03:04message to appeal to voters wary of confrontation. But whether it can truly shift the political tide in

03:09Taiwan and across the strait remains uncertain. Justin Wu and Cadence Quaranta for Taiwan Plus.

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