Former Taiwan president 'to meet Xi Jinping' during China trip Radio Free Asia

Former Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou, who is currently on a controversial tour of China in an effort to ease tensions across the Taiwan Strait, may meet Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping this week, according to a person close to him. folder.

A meeting was scheduled for Monday but was pushed back to Wednesday, coinciding with the U.S.-Japan-Filipino leaders' summit in Washington, a person familiar with the negotiations told RFA Mandarin. A Taiwanese political analyst said the date also marked the anniversary of the signing of the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979, which Beijing opposed at the time.

Ma, whose Kuomintang party once ruled China, fled to Taiwan after losing a civil war to Mao Zedong's communists in 1949 and ruled as an authoritarian dictatorship for several decades before being replaced. voted in democratic elections in 2016. He arrived in China on April 1 for an 11-day visit to promote peace.

“The meeting between Ma and Xi is taking place at the invitation of China; it was Xi Jinping who decided that they would meet,” said a person familiar with the matter.

The meeting comes as China seeks to improve relations with its main diplomatic partners and ease its growing international isolation, the source said.

“By meeting with Ma Ying-jeou, Beijing is giving the impression that dialogue between Beijing and Taiwan is still possible,” they said.

Taiwan has never been ruled by the Chinese Communist Party, nor is it part of the 73-year-old People's Republic of China, and most of its 23 million people I have no wishes give up their sovereignty or democratic way of life to be governed by China, according to several public sources opinion polls during the last years.

Neither Ma nor Chinese officials confirmed he would meet with Xi.

Beijing has called Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen and her Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) “dangerous separatists” and refused government-to-government talks stipulated by the Tsai administration as a precondition for cross-Strait negotiations. Taiwan.

Travel criticized

During this time, Mas made repeated trips to China. criticized by Tsai and her officials as undermining the island's government, because its insistence on a Chinese identity for Taiwan reinforces Beijing's territorial claims.

In a process that began with inviting Taiwanese politicians to visit China last year, provided they do not reject Beijing's territorial claims on the island, Beijing wants to counter the impression created by his “wolf warrior” diplomacy in recent years. the person said.

Ma on Monday visited the historic Marco Polo Bridge, where the first shots were fired during the Japanese invasion, and expressed his desire to cry when considering the heroism of the Chinese people who resisted.

“There are no winners in war, and there are no losers in peace,” he told reporters at the scene. “War mistakes can be forgiven, but historical truth cannot be forgotten.”

Ma last met Xi in Singapore in late 2015 at a historic summit, shortly before incumbent President Tsai won a landslide victory in the 2016 presidential election.

He remains a senior member of the Kuomintang, or KMT, which lost the presidency to the DPP for a third consecutive time in January, but holds no official position in Taiwanese politics.

Ma's visit this month coincides with the Qing Ming tomb-cleaning festival, and the former democratically elected president used his visit to the Yellow Emperor's mausoleum in the northern province of Shaanxi to call on young people of the island to “remember their Chinese roots”. ” sparking criticism in Taiwan.

He also visits a number of sites related to the fight against Japan during World War II, during which the Kuomintang government and Mao Zedong's forces formed an uneasy alliance that escalated into civil war after the surrender of the Japan in 1945.

“You're not mourning the earthquake disaster in Taiwan…instead, you're thousands of miles away, mourning the Japanese invasion in World War II ago 80 years old,” DPP lawmaker Wang Ting-yu commented in a Facebook post on April 4.

“[Yet you] “ignore the fact that the Chinese Communist Party has not renounced the use of force against Taiwan to this day,” Wang wrote, accusing Ma, who served two presidential terms from 2008 to 2016, of “echoing ” to Beijing's propaganda.

Birthday Policy

Soong Kuo-cheng, a researcher at Taiwan's National Chengchi University, said the date of Wednesday's meeting was likely carefully chosen.

“It's not just about ignoring the US-Japan summit in Washington, but also this date marks the 45th anniversary of the signing of the Taiwan Relations Act,” Soong said, referring to the 1979 law that requires the U.S. government to take steps to defend Taiwan against aggression, including authorizing arms sales.

“For 45 years, China has viewed the Taiwan Relations Act as an anti-China law aimed at protecting Taiwan,” he said. “Moving the Ma-Xi meeting date to April 10 is an anniversary policy.”

The law was described as a “gift from the US Congress to Taipei” after the US severed diplomatic relations with the Republic of China on Taiwan and transferred its diplomatic recognition to Beijing.

It was adopted to help maintain peace, security, and stability in the Western Pacific and to promote the foreign policy of the United States by authorizing the continuation of commercial, cultural, and other relations between the people of the United States and the people of Taiwan. ” following the end of formal diplomatic relations.

It also defines any threat to Taiwan as a threat to U.S. interests.

Beijing considered this law a betrayal of American commitments to its “one China” policy.

Soong said Ma's repeated message to the Taiwanese people that they share common ancestry with the Chinese is highly Sinocentric.

“Ma Ying-jeou is stupid to say that blood is thicker than water,” Soong said. “At a time when the rest of the world views the Chinese Communist Party as an enemy and Biden calls Xi Jinping a dictator, Ma is the only one crazy enough to think that not only can we trust them, but thank them too. “

Translated by Luisetta Mudie.